


In the Darkness

by emily31594



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-21
Updated: 2018-02-07
Packaged: 2018-04-16 12:38:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 71,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4625622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emily31594/pseuds/emily31594
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The darkness has always been part of her, the hopeless darkness in her soul. A tale of love, regret, vengeance, anger, and the struggle to accept that everyone is human and deserves a second chance. Outlaw Queen, post-finale.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prelude Part 1

Prelude, Part 1

 

She loves the smell of nature, the tang of freshly cut hay, the damp, cloying scent of dirt. She borders girlhood and womanhood, and her gowns and jewels are becoming larger, heavier. They reek of perfume, sparkle with jewels, and ruffle with lace. The brighter her jewels become, the more they weigh her down, until the glint of silver and diamond during the day makes her neck and back ache at night. She always breathes a sigh of relief when she changes them for her riding clothes, in which she can run and breathe. She takes ladylike steps until she is far enough from the windows to feel secure, and then she breaks into a run, her braids rushing behind her in the wind, and she smiles. The sun bathes her in gentle, natural light, so much more welcome than the bright court light that weighs her down, and she is warm and gentle like it, a girl who loves her mother and her daddy and believes in light and love and fairy tales.  
Daniel smells like hay, dirt, grass, freedom. Their relationship does not ignite like fire, the way her magic burns in a crisis. It rises between them gently, the way the wind brushes against her skin when she steps onto the castle grounds. It should occur to her that their friendship is dangerous for him in a way that it is not for her. Her mother will marry her into royalty, and he will marry a kitchen maid and his children will look after her children’s horses. But life has not yet taught her to be so suspicious, or so concerned for her future. She looks at obstacles and she sees possible ways around them, and she believes she is strong enough to try.  
One night, she feigns a spell of dizziness at the ball, lets one of the men her mother has courting her escort her to a balcony, and slips away. Her father will cover for her. He is capable of helping her escape to what he believes is solitude; he wishes for it himself, and never has the courage to demand it.   
She and Daniel make a dinner of the fruit from her apple tree, giggling and hiding in a stable, and the darkness that night is beautiful. It hides them.   
She kisses him for the first time.  
He tastes like apples and smells like sun-bleached linen, and she has to guide his hand to her neck before he will touch her.  
She returns to her room hours later through the servant stairs, fighting her smile in case her mother lurks around a corner, sunlight in her heart.  
.  
.  
.

Mother drags her out of bed early the next day, admonishing her for being late to the stables. Regina brightens at the prospect, but bites her tongue.   
“I’m not running late, Mother,” she argues, and the need for secrecy will slowly teach her to be angry to hide her joy.   
When she returns from the stables, her mother is angry.  
“Regina, where have you been? We have guests!” she yells.  
Her snark and sass later in life didn’t come out of nowhere. “I’ve been busy, Mother, you need not know where,” she retorts. “I do things other than to please you.”  
Cora slaps her, her hand rough against her daughter’s nose, cheek, and lips. One of her many rings catches her lip, and Regina feels her skin tear and begin to bleed. “Do not speak to me that way, disobedient child!”   
Her father enters the room, sees Cora’s hand poised to strike again as blood trails down his daughter’s lip, and Regina cries, “Daddy!” He begins to back away. “Listen to your mother, my child.”  
Regina turns on her mother. “I’m not a child, Mother!”  
She runs back to her room with her hand on her face. A glance in the mirror tells her it will likely scar.   
She begins to drag on her ball gown angrily, then decides she will be regal, collected, show her mother it can’t get to her. Cora arrives when she has almost finished, and begins to help her fasten jewelry around her neck. Regina hates this necklace; it is too bright, and too heavy, but it makes her look powerful, calm.  
“I’m sorry dear,” her mother says, her voice sickly sweet. “I love you. I just want what’s best.”  
“I love you too,” she whispers, the truth. As her mother begins to fuss over her hair, she stares at herself in the mirror, a different creature entirely than the one who laughs with Daniel in the stables, and she wonders, Best for whom.  
She loves them both, she can’t help it, but she doesn’t want to be either one of them. Not her quick-to-anger mother, so hungry for power rather than happiness, but just as much, maybe even more, not her weak, foolish father.   
.  
.  
.

Something inside of her is dark, a power she has unintentionally used to throw her parents and servants back when they anger her. Her mother encourages her to feel its power, to let it rise up within her until the candles in her room flicker, until the heat and darkness burns her. She hates the darkness, wants the sunlight and fields and Daniel. Her magic is dark and angry, and while sparkling bright light weighs her down, the darkness does too, the equally unnatural, hopeless darkness in her soul.   
But she and Daniel, they are young, and in love, and she is happy, and she forgets about the darkness with him.  
“A foolish stable boy didn’t take enough care, I’m afraid,” Cora had said, to explain the angry red of her daughter’s upper lip to their guests.  
Regina had given a polite nod, but her hands had clenched under the table. Of all the ways to explain it away, her mother would blame Daniel.   
Later, years and years later, she wishes that her mother had been right. She would much prefer to look at her face and see a scar because he’d not held her waist tight enough as she leapt from the saddle, or had been too distracted by her smile to warn her about a low tree branch. She thinks about it again when she gives up his ring, the last physical reminder of him in existence, that the scar is not from him, and wonders briefly what he’d think of her now. Knows in her heart he’d be horrified.


	2. Prelude, Part 2

Prelude, Part 2

Leopold is cold with her, she with him, and they feel nothing. He is predictable; he comes to her bed infrequently, a duty, a desire for a boy. It grates her that he keeps the fireplace roaring.   
She does not want the warmth.  
She does not want to look into his face.  
She does not want him to look into hers.  
She cannot bear it.  
And yet she must.  
She has lost the love of her life, her freedom, her sunlight. She plays mother to a girl barely younger than herself. Blaming her parents, the last people alive who love her, is impossible; blaming others is easy. She will not admit until a hopeful afternoon in front of a roaring fire with her soul mate that the only person she truly blames is herself.  
.  
.  
.

The Evil Queen moves her chambers to the top of the castle, in the cold wind. There is no fire, no sunlight, no light, just her garish jewelry and black clothes and darkness. And she is empty. She has to be, has to protect herself from the horror of what she’s doing, and she empties herself out until the jewelry and the black and the darkness and her hatred is everything. Where hope and love and sunlight had once filled her heart, she lets in rage and vengeance until the veins rot.   
When the small fragments of her soul not consumed by grief and anger seep through, she goes to the forest to think. In some ways it smells of Daniel and the stables and freedom of her childhood, but the density of the trees holds in damp and keeps out light, and it is darker.  
She sleeps with guards, the often equally empty men who serve her. It is quick, and frenzied, and always, always in the dark. She does not want to see their faces, and she does not want them to see hers when it is anything but collected and powerful and caked in makeup. She tells herself they satisfy, and perhaps they do in some ways, all of them strong and handsome, but she has emptied her soul, and little remains with which to feel.  
When she awakes to her victory in Storybrooke, she expects it all to come rushing back. She expects to feel alive again, to feel as though a heart actually does beat in her chest.  
But they do not know it. No one knows she has won. She has killed the last person who would care in her efforts to get here, and that empties the victory of all meaning, and nobody in this town feels anything for her. Not even hate.   
.  
.  
.

Her heart feels warmth, truly feels it again the first time her Little Prince calls her Mama. He’s been babbling for weeks, but one morning she leans over his crib to pick him up and he puts his chubby little hands on her cheeks and says “Mama”. A giggle bubbles from his throat when he sees his mama’s smile, and he says it again, and her heart swells. Smiling through the tears, she presses a sloppy kiss to his forehead, then each of those little hands, and lifts him into her arms. “Yes, Henry. I’m your Mama,” she croons, and he babbles and plays with her necklace. Someone in this town feels something for her, and what they feel is even better than hate. It’s love.  
She will never remember that she had an inkling of Henry’s identity. She will never remember that she already loved him so much that she chose to forget rather than send him away, even though she knew he might lead to the end of her curse, her supposed happy ending.   
He became her happy ending. She remembers that.  
She holds on too tight, and he has to remind her that that isn’t love, but she learns, and he lets her.  
She aches, sometimes, especially when he is a baby, that she did not carry him. Rests her hands against her belly and wonders if it is the same, wonders how it would be different if he were hers. She avoids thoughts of Daniel in this, did not name her son after him for a reason, to avoid that constantly poisonous reminder in their lives, but she cannot stop herself from wondering if she would be a more natural mother if her child were naturally hers.  
This worry more or less vanishes after a few months of motherhood, but it returns with a vengeance when Emma appears, when Henry gravitates to her and not to Mom.   
.  
.  
.  
True love’s kiss cures her. They have the pure love of mother and child, as natural as the love between Henry and Emma, though she carried him and Regina did not.   
He believes in her, believes her to be a hero, encourages her to do the right thing. The truest believer. If the boy she raised can be that, there must’ve been just enough good left in her to pass on to him. To give him the sunlight and freedom without the weight and darkness, enough love in her dark heart for the unconditional love of a mother, and she loves him also for showing her that.


	3. Dreams

_Before I start I just wanted to address a question from an anonymous review. When I said "It's not Robin; It's what he represents" I probably would've been more accurate to say "It's not just Robin; It's also what he represents" because I in no way mean to imply that she isn't genuinely and deeply in love with him, just that their relationship encouraged, but did not cause, her growth, and that it was possible because she had already come so far. And that the hopelessness isn't really because the man she loves is with another woman (though that stings) but because she's yet again trapped by her dark past and a situation that must make her feel as though fate doesn't think she deserves happiness._

**Ten Days Ago**

The fire that illuminates the lion tattoo when she approaches him in the forest throws gentle light. Not the natural sun of her days with Daniel, older, more complex, the forest darker but the fire more bright.

They kiss until their lips ache, and the light that ignites within her feels different than other love she has known. Daniel had been dappled sunlight breaking through clouds. Robin is fire burning through the walls around her heart. She brings much to this decision to take a step towards him. Complicated, mixed up, agonized-over feelings and choices and loses, and their release is not a breeze, it is a flame, licking at the disused corners of her heart and soul until everything, the good and bad, comes alive once more. _Was being happy such a terrible fate? Love is weakness! Love again. Don't let anything hold you back. There you go, telling the truth again. I think, deep down, you want to talk about it. You don't live your life! Villains don't get happy endings. You're not a villain._ Words swirl through her head, but damn it, she is the Queen, and for every angering or hurtful or dangerously hopeful memory, she tugs again at his hair, kisses him harder.

They slow to short pecks after a while so they can catch their breath, and she finds that they have stumbled until he rests against a tree, that their scarves and coats lie on the ground somewhere behind them.

"I'm," he pants, and she smirks at his breathlessness, "so glad you finally did that, Milady." His head falls back against the tree bark as he uses the hands on her hips to tug her even closer.

"Regina," she finally says, her eyes flitting around his face for a sign of what to do next, surprised she doesn't feel an absolute need to take charge, forgetting for a moment to glare at his teasing.

"You have the most beautiful smile," he says, touching her cheek reverently with one finger, and that makes the smile she hadn't noticed grow wider.

He meets her for coffee and breakfast an hour and a half before her meetings for the next few days, because suggesting anything earlier feels overeager. They drink very little coffee, eat nothing, kiss while leaning against her kitchen counter, on the walk to her meeting, in the hallway outside. He says things sweeter than she deserves and then teases her out of thoughts of deserving, makes her cry and laugh and flirts with her in the same breath, and it's wonderful.

.

.

.

She can feel it the moment he takes her heart back from Zelena. Their eyes meet, and her chest feels warm, not only because of what he means to her but because someone is fighting with her, for her. She is not alone, not anymore. She chose vengeance and evil, and lost, but today she has chosen good. And she wins, and the tiniest piece of hope from her girlhood returns. She looks up to see everyone else walking away, Hook and Emma and David with the baby, leaving her to deal with her sister, but he stays right beside her, still alert, his eyes focused on her.

He encourages her to go talk to her sister with a squeeze of the hand, says he'll be at her house in an hour after he checks on Roland, and she has won, and someone is with her to care.

Regina speaks with her sister from the Sheriff's desk. She feels the sunlight harsh against one side of her face, throwing the other half into shadow. Light, and darkness, and everything in between in every person, and she wants to help her sister understand that there is always, always a choice. Not between having the darkness or having the light, but between giving into the dark, the hatred, the evil, easy vengeance, and fighting for the humanity, the burdensome love that is everything. This faith will soon turn to ashes.

.

.

.

She'd really loved the idea of having a sister.

**Present**

"Regina, there's…I'm sorry, but there's more."

"What?" she bites out, putting her gloves back on in one harsh, smooth gesture, and flicking her hair out of her scarf.

"We rescued her from execution at…" Emma struggles.

"Spit it out, Ms. Swan. From where?" She hasn't used this voice with Emma since the days when they volleyed the phrase: _He's my son_ , between them. Her first instinct is to throw fireballs at somebody, but she's leaving instead. _He_ is not the only reason she has changed, and neither he nor Emma Swan is worth the reversal of everything she's worked so hard to be.

"Your dungeons," Emma says. Regina freezes, her hands lowering mechanically from her shoulders.

The panic descends like a curse cloud, and it is everywhere, all at once, clouding her vision, her thought, her hearing. She searches her memory, _surely_ she'd have known, but there is nothing, no Marian to be recalled, and she knows that doesn't mean anything, because she killed many whose faces she never learned. Regina had always known it would come, but not like this, never like this, Robin's proof of the horror of the Evil Queen. He would have chosen Marian anyway, of course, but in about five minutes his wife will have told him the story and he will also hate her forever. Her soul mate will hate her for her past, _how fitting_ , the fire he'd ignited in her abruptly reduces into charred remains, just like her soul. Old habits die hard, and when she feels a hand on her elbow, a flame rises in her palm, and she has thrown Emma to the ground several feet away from her. She feels every eye in the diner turn to her, Charming is standing between her and his daughter, and someone's holding Henry back, she can hear him struggling, to reach her or Emma, she doesn't know. "Regina," she hears, and she stores the lilt of concern in his voice, because that's the last time she'll hear it, and the guilt is suffocating. She hears his near-silent footfalls in the dead silent room, coming closer, and she does what Zelena had been right to say she always does when things get hard. She turns on her heels, and runs away in a cloud of purple.

Self-hatred follows the panic quickly, then grief, anger, sadness, horror, all of it making her heart pound as she stumbles home, her magic pathetically landing her a block from her home. She feels numb to the evening cold, barely aware of her surroundings until she realizes she's at her front door. The tears have been trapped in her eyes just short of falling, but as she steps onto the porch, the warmth of his lips on hers and the sound of Roland's giggle as she lifted him onto her hip mere hours ago haunt her. She sinks to the ground against her door as she pushes it shut, and the silent sobs shake her body until her muscles ache.

**One Day Ago**

He enters with her heart in his hands, says he prefers burning wood to the electricity to which he's still not accustomed. Together, they push her heart back into her chest as the firelight flickers on their skin. She sags into his arms as _feeling_ rushes over her, and she could not explain, and he does not ask. Perhaps it's the yellow-orange of the firelight, but she sees more red, less black in the veins of her heart than when she held it last.

She opens up, apologizes, all of it new, all healing. Regina knows that if he heard the whole story about Daniel, he would tell her not to blame herself, but she does not tell it. She's not ready to hear that. Not yet. Perhaps, someday, she will be. She cradles his hand to her chest, just above her heart, tells him their story. And now he _knows_ the burden and blessing she's carried about their relationship since its very start, and this caring man, he absolves her of her guilt for being too afraid to open up to him at that tavern, smiles when she expects anger and disappointment. She should know by now; he never does what she expects. _Maybe it's all about timing_ he says, and it's such a beautiful thought, that everything in both of their lives has led them to this moment. She doesn't fight her smile, and the smile as she'd held his face between her hands had been so heavy, but this is light.

They kiss gently for a long time after they talk, his hands on her back, hers on his shoulders. The fire fills the cold, black-and-white room with life and shadows and grey. He uses the arm at her shoulders to lower her to the rug, and her eyes flutter open as his weight settles on top of her and his hands twist in her hair. Robin smiles as she lowers his mouth to hers with a hand at the back of his neck. The kisses are warm and open-mouthed and breathtaking from the start, her tongue sliding against his, his hands flexing, squeezing hers as she lifts a leg around his waist, and it has never felt like this. Leopold, Graham, the empty men from her royal guard, had never touched her like this, nor she them. She has never delighted as much in someone else's pleasure as her own. Robin rocks against her, his lips gliding along her jaw, his teeth nipping earlobe, his tongue flicking at her pulse point. A moan tumbles out of her mouth as she lifts her hips to meet his, and she feels simultaneously utterly relaxed and so aroused she could scream. He seems content to kiss and suck and nip at every inch of the skin he can reach, searching for the spots that make her gasp and writhe beneath him, but there will be time for that, and her heart is back in her chest, and she wants him now. She pushes his coat from his shoulders, yanks his scarf free of his neck, lifts the other leg around his waist, and rolls them so that he is beneath her. He looks up at her, his smirk transformed into a dazed smile. His palm runs up her back, his fingers grasping at the zipper of her dress, his other hand brushing hair out of her face with such tenderness and intimacy that she shudders, and she cannot stop her battered, treacherous heart from swelling with joy.

_._

_._

_._

"This rug is getting rather uncomfortable," he complains. She groans as his lips pause against her stomach.

"Says the man who lives in the forest," she gripes, and the frustration would be more convincing if a kiss to her ribs had not made her breath hitch at the end.

"If we're going for round two," he groans as her arms lift to wrap around his neck and her toes trail up his calf, and they definitely are, "I intend to take my time with you. I merely wish milady to be comfortable."

She sighs a long-suffering sigh, raises one arm, and purple smoke clouds the room. When they land on her bed she is on top of him, her legs and arms pinning him to the mattress.

She quickly collapses onto him, her magical aim a little imprecise, their elbows and knees knocking. Regina feels the laugh that rumbles through his chest, surprising herself when she begins to laugh as well, the pair of them giggling like children. He lifts himself onto a forearm so that he can kiss her jaw, his hand reaching to curl her hair behind her ear. "Someone a bit distracted?" he asks, his lips brushing against her ear. She shivers, and then she's pushing him back into the mattress, her lips harsh and needy against his in retaliation. He groans as his hands grasp at her hips, his muscles quivering, trying to pull her closer. Robin whines when she lifts her hips away, her mouth falling to his wrist instead. His eyes nearly roll back when he realizes that her lips have begun to trace his tattoo. Her legs still pin him to the mattress on either side of his hips, his whole body tense beneath her. "Regina," he gasps, and the spot is sensitive anyway, but there's something about its history between them that makes her touch even more powerful.

"How did you get this?" she wonders, as her teeth nip at the mark.

"The King," he says, gasping in a breath, "to remind me of loyalty after some things went…missing from his coffers and appeared in a local village."

She chuckles darkly against his arm, her tongue now soothing the reddened skin. "Thief."

"Mhm," he agrees, and he'd agree to just about anything she said right now.

She kisses her way back down his arm until she's above him again, grinning at the sounds that slip out of his mouth.

He distracts her with a heady kiss and rolls them gently until he's above her, his lips falling to her neck. "My turn…" he breathes. She squirms as her hands rise to tangle in his hair. He kisses her under her jaw, against her pulse, on her collarbone, until he finds the spots that make her fingers clench, and in minutes he's already familiar with several. She tries to pull his face back up to hers, but he shakes his head into her skin. She growls in frustration as he moves his attentions to her shoulder.

" _After_ ," she demands, "take all the time you want."

It's almost sweet, the childish disappointment that flits across his face, but she's not sure she can fathom what this is. Sex, pleasure, these things she has had before, but the thought that he wants to explore her body, find what pleasures her, learn about each mark, each scar, touch every inch of skin--that's new. Part of her finds it exhilarating, the idea that he might want her, all of her, and yet she fears what he'll find, fears the intense vulnerability with all her soul, fears— _knows—_ that he will hate the twisted darkness.

He relents, seems to sense when he's pushing her too much, and she almost wishes he wouldn't, wishes he'd ignore her trepidations. She kisses his temple, an apology, and hates that she can feel tears pooling in her eyes. He kisses them away until a smile shines on her face again, smiling at her himself.

She flips them over. "Someone needs to wipe that damned smirk off your face."

His hands tangle automatically in her hair. "By all means, milady, feel free to try."

.

.

.

Regina feels boneless afterwards, lying in his arms as he places languid kisses to the back of her neck.

"That heart of yours really is incredible."

She turns over on her shoulders, her hand under his jaw. "Hm?"

"Feeling fully. Not that the kissing wasn't incredible before, but…"

She swats his shoulder, but there's a soft smile on her face, and he studies her lips, as if to search out the features that make them so potent.

He runs the pad of his thumb against the scar on her upper lip, his expression suddenly sobering.

"My mother," she answers his unspoken question, her lips twisted into a bitter half-smile. "For my attitude."

He kisses the mark, then her lips, and distracts them both thoroughly for several minutes with short kisses traded between them. She hums as he runs his thumb over and over it, as if to soothe the hurt.

"She loved me very much," she says when they part, "and I loved her."

"That's not enough." He kisses the mark again, senses the tears in the back of her eyes, and bumps the tip of her nose playfully with his. "Besides," he says, grinning, "I like your attitude." Her face crinkles up in a grin, her expression breathtaking.

He lifts a hand to her cheek, smoothes hair behind her ear, notices something he never has before. "What is this? A burn?" He runs his pointer finger against it.

Her brow furrows. "What?"

"On your hairline."

Regina reaches a hand to feel where his threads through her hair. "It's a scar."

"A recent one?"

"Not particularly."

"I've never seen anything like it." he says, a question.

"In this world, they can channel electricity, the same kind that powers lights, machines, so that it brings pain to the nerves," she explains softly, "The skin is just a side effect."

His eyes widen in horror, and she sighs, turning the slightest bit away from him and his warmth.

He puts a few fingers over the scar. "Where did you get it?"

"Just punishment," she says, her voice flat. She flinches as the ghost of the pain comes back, and she can almost feel the cold, hard table against her shoulder blades, can almost smell the rotting fish of the docks.

He breaks her out of the memory with a gentle, lingering kiss to the mark, his hand cradling her head, and turns her back to face him. "Couldn't have been. Pain is never an excuse to inflict pain on others."

She laughs harshly. "I used exactly that excuse for years, Robin." She threads fingers through his hair and pushes it out of his eyes.

"I didn't say it was an easy lesson to learn. Not for me, either."

He is a fool, an idealistic idiot, but there is no pity in his gaze, no smile, just forgiveness that is not his to give.

She runs her other hand up his forearm, against the tattoo, tabling that particular discussion for now. "Fate has an odd sense of humor, doesn't it, binding you to me? The Prince of Thieves and the Evil Queen." She sounds teasing, but he hears the insecurity beneath it, sees the fear in her eyes.

"Quite the forbidden love story," he agrees, holding her tight against him. "But as individuals I'd say we're quite a good match."

She grins, tucking her face into his neck. "I suppose we are."

**Present**

When Regina wakes, her neck is at an odd angle and the sun is too bright in her eyes. She touches her smeared makeup with disgust. She's still in the dress that he zipped up for her yesterday afternoon, now ruined with wrinkles. She climbs the stairs to her bedroom with determination, briefly considers using magic, and instead turns on scalding water for a shower. When she gets out, she takes the grey dress, grabs the red one she'd worn two days ago for good measure, and flicks her hand. They go up in flames and vanish without a trace. She emerges from her room half an hour later in sleek black, her makeup flawless, but she isn't the empty woman from the Enchanted Forest, and her victory over her appearance helps less than she'd thought.

.

.

.

_Her eyes blink open, and she feels restraints pinning her to a hard table, metal cold and firm on her wrists, ankles, and stomach. "Tell me!" a voice beside her yells, and she looks for its source. "What did my family do to you? Why did you have to destroy our happiness?" He fastens the pads to her forehead, her neck, her wrists with harsh shoves._

_He leans down until his face is beside her ear, smirking, taunting. "Too weak to stop me, Your Majesty?" He pulls back, his voice mocking. “A common thief, and the Great and Terrible Evil Queen is helpless."_

_She thinks of raising her magic to protect herself, but she cannot. There is not enough hate for him in her veins, no hate for him, to power the ashes of her dark magic. And the light magic, the white, blinding, blistering light magic recoils at the idea of hurting him because it comes from love, and it will not harm a part of her own soul._

_"You can't attack me, can you?" he concludes, searching her eyes, not at all like he used to before, not kindly, but with revulsion in his gaze. "Ah, does the Evil Queen still have feelings for me? Isn't that precious!"_

_And she will not cry, she will not cry, she will not show weakness, but her heart, it has shattered into fragments, and she loves him still. Last time, she had told Greg Mendel to kill her, and she had meant it. He had been justified to do what he did, more than she ever had been to chase Snow._

_This time, the small corner of her mind still burning with the hopes of her girlhood whispers he might still care enough to stop, because she doesn't want to die._

_"Let's see how you like it, then, shall we," he says, his voice now quiet and menacing._

_He turns a dial up, presses a red button. She starts as the pain licks at her spine._

_"Not enough, then." He rolls up his sleeves, the ink of the tattoo harsh against his skin in the sickly yellow light, mocking her even more than his words, and he turns the dial as far as it will go._

_The worst pain she has ever felt rips through her. She feels her back arch off the table, her neck bent at an unnatural angle, the veins protruding out of her pallid skin, and she screams._

_"Regina!" another voice yells, not his, and she whimpers as the pain lapses for a moment. "Regina! Wake up, come on, Regina, wake up." Hands are shaking her shoulders harshly._

Her eyes fly open, and she starts back instinctively, her back slamming into her living room couch. Emma Swan is holding her shoulders, staring into her wild eyes. One of the less pleasant dreams her brain has concocted in the last few days, she thinks wryly.

"Ms. Swan. What are you doing here?" Regina puts a wrist to her temple, feeling the ghost of electrocution pads and shocks wracking her body in the worst pain she's ever felt, and forces her breathing into a slower rhythm.

"I came to get Henry for brunch at Granny's. I called and asked last night?"

"I remember," Regina snaps on reflex, blinking to clear her eyes. She struggles to lift herself off the ground, and has to catch herself against the grey sofa before her knees give out.

"You can come, too, if you want?” Regina can't stand the pity dripping from every word.

Silence stretches between them for a few seconds until Henry steps into the room. "Mom?" he asks, looking at Emma. "What's wrong?" He looks at Regina, and she knows it must be obvious that she's not slept; she's in yesterday's clothes, and he must've heard the screaming. "Mom?" he asks again, this time directed at Regina, who fights to give him a tight smile.

"We'll leave in a minute, Henry. Go wait for me in the car," Emma says. Regina would argue, but she wants Henry out of here too.

"But—" he begins.

"Wait for her in the car, Henry," Regina urges without looking at him. "I'll come say goodbye before you leave."

He relents.

"Want to tell me what the hell that was?" Emma asks when he's out of earshot.

"I'm fine, Ms. Swan."

"Obviously not. Come on, Regina, I can always tell when you're lying."

"It does not concern you." But she's a Charming, and of course she thinks everyone's pain concerns her.

Sure enough, she argues. "It does if Henry's going to be around to see it. You were screaming; you were obviously in pain."

"Then why don't you keep him until I'm—"Regina cuts off when she feels the anger creep into her voice, and tries again, "he shouldn't have to watch his mother…he's too young."

Emma gives her that smile again, and squeezes her arm. "He loves you very much, you know. Many people do, besides…" Emma seems to realize she's come perilously close to bringing _him_ up, and trails off. "Call me whenever you feel ready for him to come back for a visit. And please let me know if there's anything you need."

And there it is again, that sickly sweet pity. "Not from you," she says evenly. After all, she still has her dignity.

"I am sorry for the pain I've caused you," Emma says.

Regina feels the beginnings of a chokehold rising in her fingertips, and fights it down, _for Henry_ , she thinks. She straightens her dress and clears her throat, now fully awake. "You have what you want, Ms. Swan; Henry's yours for the next few days. Now get out of my home," she bites out.

Emma flinches with something like fear, and Regina wonders how much of the Evil Queen Snow White's daughter had dealt with on her little trip to the past. The fear feeds her anger, her sense of power, and she rises to her full height, her chin held high. _Just like your mother_ Regina thinks again, as Emma hesitates to leave, as though she could make any of it better. "I said get out, Ms. Swan."

Emma obeys, _finally,_ after a squeeze to Regina's wrist that almost makes her rip the blonde's heart out for the presumption. Regina sinks to the couch, her eyes staring blankly, painful electricity buzzing between her ears, and it isn't until she hears the car pull away that she remembers her broken promise to Henry.

 


	4. Villainy

**Storybrooke, Present**

She'd really thought she could avoid him for a few errands around town. In any case, she absolutely refuses to hide out in her house for one more day. Everyone stares at her, of course, like they did in the weeks after the first curse broke, but she's long been able to ignore such attention.

She goes to work having counted herself safe for the day.

He's outside when she leaves.

"Regina," he says, his voice loud and solid. She ignores him, keeps walking.

"Regina," he repeats as she passes him, this time more adamant. "Regina!"

She whips around to face him. "Scamper off, outlaw," she snarls.

Fury rises on his face. "No, you don't get to do that. You don't get to ignore me and hide behind coldness. You killed my _wife_?"

"Apparently," she bites out.

"Regina," he pleads, as though she could take back her actions with her words, erase it all.

"What?" she snaps, and she's yelling at him now, her voice in a dark register, her feet unmoving. "What do you want from me? You knew who I was, what I did." There's a hint of betrayal in her voice, a hint she knows he does not deserve, but she feels it anyway.

"But how could you—?"

"Murder her?" she interrupts, and the words are slow, carefully articulated. Brutal. She doesn't know what reaction she's trying to get out of him: disgust, hatred, anger.

"Forget about what she did, our baby was completely innocent," he bellows, and he's holding out his arms as if he can feel the phantom weight of his baby, of _Roland_ , crying for his mother. "She had a little boy waiting with me for her to come home, barely a year old. How could you be so _evil_?" he finishes, his entire face contorting with the word.

She'd known it was coming, but the venom of his words still stuns her, and she is _not_ going to cry in front of him, she will not, and she thinks of her nightmare and the monster he was in it, and maybe the nightmare had been trying to show her herself.

She starts to walk away, and he grabs her wrist.

"Don't touch me." She shocks them both when she throws him back several feet, and he stumbles to keep his balance.

And he just stands there, his mouth half-open, staring at her. "You will always be that!" he cries, his fists clenched. "Evil. The Evil Queen who separated parents and children in the name of vengeance."

She draws blood when she bites her lip to keep back the sob, and lifts her chin haughtily in the air. She takes fast, determined steps toward him, her heels clicking on the pavement. "I know that," she growls, and with her breath comes the scent of _forest_ and _Robin_ and she wants to cry and burn it all at once "And _you_ will always be an insufferable, common thief who steals things that aren't his."

She stalks off before he can see her breaking, and does not see him sink to the ground with a hand on his forehead and tears in his eyes.

It isn't until minutes later that she realizes she'd been talking about her heart.

**The Enchanted Forest, One Year Ago**

She misses Henry most in these moments, when they're on the move and in between fights, and there's nothing much to be done. She can hear and see him best when they're not fighting. He'd be asking David to work with him on his swordplay, or poring over his storybook in a tent, or begging her in a voice full of wonder for new stories as they passed each landmark. Regina rests a hand against the bark of a tree, and thinks inexplicably of Henry's castle playground, and with a sad smile she thinks he would've loved to get a tour of the real thing. As she begins to walk again, something barrels into her legs, not big enough to upset her balance. She looks down to see a little boy who's been knocked to the ground, his lip trembling.

She squats down immediately and picks him up under his arms so that he's standing again. "Are you all right, Roland?"

He nods, then shakes his head, a tear sliding down his cheek. "What's wrong sweetheart?"

"I'm running from the monsters," he says seriously.

"What monsters?" she fixes his cape around his shoulders, brushing off the dirt.

"The ones who tried take me away. I heard a noise and it—it—it sounded like—" he dissolves into hiccoughing sobs, and she pulls him into a hug.

"The monsters can't get you. I promise. We'll all protect you."

"That's what Daddy—" he chokes out, his hands grabbing at her shoulders, "Daddy says." He buries his face in her shoulder.

"Well your daddy is right." She rubs circles into his back until his breathing evens out, Her legs are cramping from squatting in heels, so she stands with him in her arms, resting him on her hip.

"Can I tell you a secret, Roland?" she asks, still patting his back gently.

He pulls his head out of her shoulder at that, interested, and nods solemnly.

"The monsters can't get you when you're with me," she says, her nose scrunching. She uses the hand that isn't holding him to brush the tears off his cheeks. "Do you know why?"

He shakes his head, and she starts walking them back to the group, shifting him fluidly to the other hip as she'd done with Henry hundreds of times when he was this age.

"Because I'm the Queen," she explains, "and those monsters wouldn't dare attack you again while you're traveling with me."

And that's only partially true, but they will all protect this little boy, the only child in their company, their source of wonder and beauty, and so he needn't be afraid.

Roland's eyes widen and he puts one hand on the side of her head. "You're Queen?" he says with wonder, "But you not have a _crown_!"

Regina chuckles at his logic and taps his nose with one finger. "Well Queens don't have to wear crowns all of the time," she says, "especially when they're talking with special four-year-old boys like you."

"Four and one quarter," Roland says proudly, and she remembers Henry caring about such distinctions when he was little, always so eager to grow up fast. She pushes away the agony of that thought. She will never see him grow up anymore; he will always be twelve to her.

"And do you know what else?" she asks. She isn't sure if it lessens or intensifies the hurt that she's holding a little boy who's not her own, but what she says is true all the same "My magic will protect you, too. I protect four and one quarter year old boys the best of all."

He grins at her. "Okay, Your Majesty," he says, looking so proud to have remembered the term. The power of her magic is beautiful to this child, and that has tears fighting to slip out of her eyes. She doesn't want to be Your Majesty to him.

"You know what, since we're friends, and I'm not even wearing a crown," she ruffles his hair, and he laughs, "I think you can call me by my name."

"Like Roland?" he asks, pointing at himself.

"Yes," she nods. "You're Roland, and—I'm Regina. Even Queens have names."

His eyes widen. "Rr—rr—gina," he tries, but that's a hard word for such a small child.

"Re-gi-na," she repeats gently, looking away from him as she steps over a fallen log.

" 'Gina!" he cries, and she could swear he's inheriting his father's signature proud smirk and raised eyebrow.

"Yes, Roland," she agrees, laughing with him.

Robin is at the edge of the camp. He doesn't quite look panicked yet, but he's certainly glad to see them. He tilts his head when he hears their laughter, and lifts Roland out of her arms and into his.

"Thank you, Milady." He bounces Roland gently. "Roland can you say thank you to the Queen?"

"Thank you 'Gina," he says, his hands already curling around the stuffed monkey that his father has brought him, and Robin looks startled.

"I get to call her 'Gina," Roland says proudly, smiling at her "because we're friends."

Robin kisses his tummy and he giggles. "Do you?" Robin looks at Regina too out of the corner of his eye, "You're full of surprises. Do you want to invite 'Gina to have supper with us?"

Regina freezes; she'd never said the father had rights to that endearment as well.

" 'Gina, do you wanna come have supper with the merry men?" he asks, as Robin sets him on the ground.

Regina looks at Robin, whose eyes remain on his son, and then at Roland, who's smirking at her and damn it, it's like looking at Robin anyway, but the child's irresistible.

"All right," she agrees.

Robin shoots her a smile, a warm, genuine smile, no smirk in sight, the edges of his lips nearly to his ears, his eyes bright. She recognizes it as the gratitude of one parent to another.

Roland runs back to her and hugs his arms around her thigh, then holds them up, a universal request for a ride.

"You can walk, love. I'm sure the Queen is tired of carrying you."

Regina laughs, and this time she's the one who smirks at him as she lifts Roland into her arms.

"Which way?" she asks the boy. When Robin opens his mouth to answer, Regina sends him a quelling look. Roland points in the right direction—his father's taught him well—and Regina nods. _Clearly you have the touch of a mother._

For just a few minutes, she tells herself, she'll enjoy the company and the weight of a child in her arms.

**Storybrooke, Present, Two Days Later**

She sits on a bench by the pond in the forest, thinking of taking Henry here before he remembered who she was, of trying to get him to like her, of trying not to scare him off with an arm around his shoulder, a too hungry look, an overeager smile. But it had been nice, in some ways, because while he had not known the good, did not remember her reading him stories as they snuggled in bed, did not remember her sleeping on the floor in his room when he was sick and wiping the sweat of fevers off his forehead, did not remember her catching him at the bottom of every park slide, he also did not know who she was. He had no idea that the woman before him was an Evil Queen. She was just the Major, just Regina, the woman she had always sought to be for him. The woman she can never be for him.

She breathes in the scent of forest around her, now achingly familiar. None of her guards had known it, but there'd been a clearing in the forest much like this one beside her castle, and she'd gone there to think when, well, _thinking_ broke through to the Evil Queen. Her brow suddenly furrows as the realization peeks through, fate's cruel trick, of why the forest and its scent had always calmed her after Daniel's death, a small piece of her soul mate's identity buried in her most private habits.

 _You will always be the Evil Queen._ She stares out at the pond and stolidly ignores the tears on her cheeks.

A mop of brown curls breaks into her vision, as its owner hops onto her lap. Her arms come around Roland automatically.

"Hi, Gina!" he greets. He looks at her face and puts his little hands on her cheeks, suddenly distraught. "Why are you crying?"

"I'm just a little sad right now, sweetheart," she says, and her voice is rough and she doesn't want to scare him.

He gives her a sloppy kiss to the cheek. "My daddy always kisses me when I'm sad, and it makes me feel all better," he declares. "Do you feel better?"

"Much better, sweetheart, thank you," she says, giving him the strongest smile she can muster.

"I'm a little sad too, right now," he confesses, pouting a little.

"Are you? What's wrong?" She brushes a hand through his curls, breathes in his baby scent.

"I miss you," he says, playing with a piece of the hair on her shoulders. "I haven't seen in you in a really long time!" She thinks of how long it's felt for her, though it's been just five days, and how long it must feel to such a small child. "You said I was going to meet Henry. Can I still meet Henry?"

"Maybe sometime," she says, cuddling him close. He must have been exploring with some kind of supervision, she thinks. "Roland sweetheart, are you here with somebody?"

"My daddy!" he says, his hands fisting in her jacket. He lifts his head up as if to whisper a secret in her ear. "But I'm a merry men, and I sneaked away, just like him!"

"It seems you did," she smiles, "but—"

She turns at the sound of snapping twigs to see Robin standing a few feet from the bench, and she stops breathing and for a moment she thinks he'll rip the boy from her arms.

He kneels in front of them, instead, his son still on her lap. "Is this where you disappeared to, Roland?" he asks, grinning. He tickles the boy's side with one hand. "You're becoming quite the little outlaw, aren't you?"

Roland puffs out his chest proudly. "That's what 'Gina said."

Robin grins, and she can't tear her eyes from him. "Roland, my boy, you need to always stay where I can see you, okay? I worry about you if I don't know where you are."

"Yes, Daddy, I'm sorry. I just saw 'Gina and I wanted to say hi because I miss her. But she was crying so I gave her a kiss on the cheek to make it better, just like you do."

Robin ruffles his hair affectionately and kisses his forehead. "That was very nice of you," he says, then glances at Regina for the first time since he'd arrived, and there's so much depth to his gaze, such conflict, she cannot read them. "Now, would you go play right over there for a few minutes while I talk to Regina?" he says, pointing to a patch of grass and flowers several yards from the bench.

"Okay, Daddy," he says. He looks between the adults, curious, not entirely blind to the tension, then kisses Regina's cheek, and Robin's, and hops off her lap. Regina watches him go with a sad smile.

"May I?" Robin asks, indicating the free end of the bench.

Regina hugs her arms around her chest and gives an almost imperceptible shrug.

"I'm sorry," she whispers after a few moments. "It will never be enough, and that kills me, but I am sorry. I truly am."

"I know you are." He's not looking at her.

"Robin," she has to swallow past the lump in her throat when she says his name, "I didn't know it was her. I never would've—"

"I know that," he says as though it's the most obvious thing in the world, as though it's never occurred to him that she might've been hiding this all along, "Of course you didn't."

She stares out at the pond before them. "I killed hundreds, thousands maybe, without a thought for their families. I was ruthless, entirely unforgiving." Her hands grip the bench seat. "And you called me bold and audacious," she scoffs, "I who had caused all of your misery, who had left you a guilt-ridden widower with a motherless son."

He listens silently, but she can see him shake his head out of the corner of her eye. "You are not that woman, anymore, Regina. I know you're not."

Her fingers turn white from her grip on the bench. "Of course I am," she retorts, mindful that she's not loud enough to disturb the boy.

They sit in silence for several minutes, and they both watch Roland having what appears to be an animated discussion with a small woodland animal.

She continues without meeting his eyes, her voice deep and cracking, "I'm so sorry, Robin." She shrugs a shoulder towards Roland. "I'm sorry the woman who killed his mother has held that perfect little boy," a loud swallow, "I'm sorry you've kissed the person who caused you so much misery. I'm sorry fate tied you to…" she breaks off, her voice a whisper. "I'm sorry I wasn't brave enough to walk into that tavern."

_I'm sorry I fell in love with you._

"Regina," he sighs, glancing at her, and she was wrong about that lilt of concern, it's still there, and it burns. "I'm not sorry you've held him," they make eye contact for the first time since Roland walked away. "That little boy loves you so much."

She can't take this, whatever _this_ is, and she stands. "Tell Roland I said goodbye," she requests, turning away.

"I'm sorry, too," he says to her back. She halts. "For what I said, the other day, that was…you don't deserve that, Regina. Not from me."

She still loves the way he says her name, like he's cradling the word itself against his heart, but she cannot escape her past, and even her name means _Queen_ , a title she never wanted, a role she never wanted to play, and none of that matters now because she has **.** "Of course I do," she says quietly. "Especially from you." And she walks away.

.

.

.

"Mary Margaret? What are you doing here?" The woman has shown up on her doorstep at too late of an hour for a new parent, and there is too much determination in her gaze.

"Emma talked to me at brunch the other day, about when she picked Henry up," she says.

Regina stiffens. "I don't know what Ms. Swan has told you, but I'm fine."

She frowns, almost pouts, just as she used to when she was an equally stubborn child. "You're not, Regina, and you don't have to be."

"I don't want to talk to anyone in your _family,_ " she spits the word out as though it is poison on her lips.

"You're part of that family, too."

Regina snorts. "Yes, isn't it nice that I am yet again forced to share my life with someone who destroyed my happiness."

The woman flinches, her guilt about Daniel a knife Regina knows she can always twist in a little deeper. And she is Robin's Snow White, except she's actually guilty, and she knows what he must feel.

"I'm not just talking about Emma and Henry," Mary Margaret finally says. "We are all your family." She takes Regina's hand in both of hers. "We care about you. We _love_ you. And you might not want to admit it, but you care about us too, all of us, not just Henry."

Regina looks at their hands, and though she does not pull away, her next words are dark and venomous. " 'Stronger than ever' isn't that what you said?"

"What? What do you mean?"

"After we talked, that night, after you left, I went to Robin. I kissed him." She fights to keep her voice as neutral as she can, but for just one moment her cheeks burn with the joy of the memory, and ache as the joy crashes into hopelessness.

Her late-night visitor tilts her head, trying to work it out, encouraging her to continue.

She might as well, she tells herself, but deep down she thinks she cannot carry this burden on her own anymore, though she can't believe she's sharing it with the woman who started it all. "He is," she begins, "he _was_ my soul mate." She clears her throat. "That was why Tinkerbell was so angry at me, and why she didn't want to help us in Neverland." She swallows, clears her throat, and turns her face away. "Shortly after I married Leopold, I was…so unhappy. She took me to meet another soul mate, to Robin, and I refused to approach him. I only saw his tattoo; I refused even to look at his face! All I wanted was to stay angry at _you_."

Snow gasps, and could the woman just wear her heart somewhere other than her sleeve, just for one moment? "When did you find out that he was—?"

"The man from thirty years ago? He rolled up his sleeve twenty minutes after I met him here."

Mary Margaret does not ask about the missing year, instead seeming to forget herself for a moment. "And you found each other again, after all these years?"

Regina's shoulders tighten, and she almost slams the door in Snow's face. _I will always find you_ , and she feels nauseous.

"I'm sorry, I…" her lip trembles, also like it used to when she was a child. Regina wishes she could hate her again. Hate was so easy.

"So what is your dream?" Snow persists.

She lifts her eyes to the ceiling, as if to escape the truth. When the words come, they are harsh, and certain. "He electrocutes me, like Peter Pan's cronies. Taunts me. Accuses me justly of destroying his happiness. And I let him. I have to because…"

"Your magic will not harm your soul mate," Snow finishes.

"Yes."

"That wasn't the first time you've had that nightmare."

"No."

"He knows, that you are—?"

"Yes. I told him hours before…"

Snow pulls her into a hug. "That's horrible, I'm so sorry."

Her mouth sets into a grim line. "Hardly worse than my reality."

As she lifts her hands to her stepdaughter's back, she feels twenty again, a young woman deciding that she cannot find it within her to strangle the faultless little girl who'd made the same childish mistake of trusting Cora that Regina herself had made several times over, and for a moment she wishes with all her soul that she'd held on to that conviction. But try as she might, she cannot wish a world in which Henry does not exist, and she did not raise him.

Snow has the sense to pull away soon. "Will you come visit the baby tomorrow?" she asks.

Regina sniffles, almost embarrassed, and straightens her scarf. "That depends. Will un-Charming be there to draw his sword every time Neal starts to fidget?"

"You better believe it," Snow says, and for just one moment, they grin at each other, and she remembers that brief period when they were friends, when she brushed Snow's hair and wiped away her tears. But this isn't about the past; it's about the future. She's willing to try.

.

.

.

She asks to have Henry back the next night. He doesn't say anything, just hops out of Emma's car with his backpack slung across one shoulder, gives her a fierce hug, and runs right up to his old bedroom. The joy she feels with him, that he has his memories back and is not moving away, assures her that her heart cannot be irretrievably broken.

"Can we watch a movie, Mom? Like we used to, on the floor by the fireplace, with a picnic for dinner?"

She bites her lip, but her memories with Robin are not going to destroy her memories with her son. She cradles the back of his head, kisses his forehead. He's maybe a couple of months from reaching her height, she notes with both pride and a tinge of jealousy for those who had been around to watch him grow this year. "Of course, Henry. That sounds lovely."

The love between a mother and child, she thinks, is so uncomplicated. Maybe she deserves that.

He trips on the stairs on his way to dinner, and her magic reaches to catch him on reflex. It is white magic, light, born out of her love for him. She smiles until it reaches her whole face, tears in her eyes, and she feels that it must not be other people's belief in her but rather her belief in herself, the love from within her soul, that keeps her going. And she is proud. She cannot apologize for every sin she has ever committed, cannot adequately right them or atone for them, but she can promise to do better today, and to strive to do better tomorrow. For Henry, that will be enough.

She once told Henry that she couldn't love very well, that she had not been capable of it for a long time. Someday she'll tell him he was the reason she learned again.

" _You're not a villain. You're my mom."_ Those words are the best thing anyone has ever said to her. But she gave up one Henry to cast the curse, and another to take it back, and she wonders if this is what forgiveness will always feel like. A rush of gratitude, and then lonely misery.


	5. Breathe

**_Chapter 3_ **

_Lots of anger at Robin in the reviews. Read on, okay? Of course he didn't mean it, and of course he feels bad. :) As always, reviews are wonderful!_

It's still dark out, perhaps three in the morning, as he stares into the darkness of the woods, and he has yet to sleep. Every time he closes his eyes he pictures her crying on that bench, sees his child being much kinder to her than the man who'd fallen asleep with her in his arms not two weeks ago.

Marian steps out of their tent. They've been sharing a room but not a bed, and he can't bear to consider what she thinks of that, but he couldn't face any other way. He told her the very first night that she was back about his relationship with Regina. They'd never kept secrets, had been good friends as well as lovers, and while he did not wish her the pain of the realization, he knew better than to want to hide it from her.

"Is Roland settled back down?" he asks. It had made his heart swell with joy for her when their son asked for her and not for Daddy to soothe him back to sleep for the very first time.

"Yes," she nods, sitting on the fallen log beside him. "I'm still barely better than a stranger to him," she whispers.

He grasps her hand briefly. "He's getting to know you. Give him time."

"You have done a wonderful job raising him, Robin." She leans over to kiss his cheek.

"Thank you," he says with a genuine, if brief, smile.

_________________________________________________________

Marian can't quite contain her frown. Her Robin would've smirked and kissed her lips, but he just sits there, still, looking vaguely uncomfortable at the gesture.

She begins to tear up, feeling ridiculous. "I'm sorry," she says, her voice soft.

"You don't have to be sorry," he takes her hand between his.

She laughs through a couple of tears and raises a hand to his cheek. "How is it possible that I miss you when you're right in front of me?"

He searches her face, his guilt apparent, and she can still read that in his features, his mannerisms are mostly the same.

She bites her lip. "I suppose I would be hurt if it hadn't changed you. Losing me."

The next sound out of his mouth is something between a laugh and a sob. "I missed you so much. Every day." His hand covers hers on his cheek.

"Roland keeps telling me stories about myself." She smiles. "He knows all the best ones."

He squeezes her hand. "I wanted him to know his amazing mother, any way he could." He swallows, "I'm sorry you found me so different."

She shakes her head, "I wouldn't have wanted you to be miserable forever, Robin. You know that."

He nods. "I was miserable for a long time."

"But you weren't when I got here. I can tell."

"No."

Her brow furrows, and she continues, "He had some other stories, too, about his 'Gina."

He sucks in a breath.

"I'm not sure I can believe it, but she's been very kind to him."

"I trust her with his life. I _have_ trusted her with his life. She's not like she was..."

"Of course she's not. That woman would've thrown a fireball at me in the diner, and the one I met was crying. I walked past her the other day holding Snow White's new baby."

He lets out a single sob, his mouth clamping shut just barely too late to contain it. "Marian, you shouldn't have to…. This must be horrible for you. You have every right to be angry, furious at her, and at me."

"Would my anger do anything but hurt both you and Roland? I know she was going to, but she didn't actually hurt me. Now she never will. I've never been one for revenge, and I trust your judgment."

He scoffs. "I wish I did."

She moves a little closer.

He lets out a shaky breath. "I confronted Regina the other day, about…"

"Me?"

"Yes. And I said some things that were…"

Marian sighs, defeated. "Go check on her."

"Why?"

"Because nothing's ever been able to keep you from doing what you think is the right thing," she grins, "not even the law. I would hate to be the reason you start."

"But how can you…"

"I know you pretty well, remember? Or I did." She looks down.

He lifts her chin. "I haven't changed that much. And I still want to—"

"Robin, we were never going to fall back into the ease I left behind with you. I may not be able to fathom it, but I can tell by how much you've changed. It's been a long time for you, and it's felt even longer." He starts to interrupt, and she shushes him, "Robin, the only thing you absolutely owe me is the opportunity to bond with my son. And consideration in your choices."

"Of course I consider what—"

"Robin," and she puts a hand at the back of his head. "I also want your honesty. Is there really nothing you owe her?"

"I…I had to be both mother and father to Roland. He lost his Mama. And I was...I was a mess for years. I'm not sure I can face forgiving her for that."

"You don't have to, you know. Just…Roland and I are here, and we're fine. I've been here two weeks. I have all of the Merry Men around me. You don't need to be watching over us every second." She sighs, taking his hand. "I love you very much, and I want us to work on this, but I don't want you to feel obligated to sit next to me when you're worried about someone else that you care about. We both deserve better than that."

He kisses her forehead slowly, and she watches with mild relief as the guilt that has been twisting his features eases a little. "I should probably make sure that she's...I was cruel to her."

She stands. "I'll go snuggle with Roland. He lets me now, you know," and there are tears in her eyes, some of them happy.

He wipes the tears away with one hand. "You're incredible. Far too wise and far too kind for me."

"Always was."

He chuckles, a few tears in his eyes too. Then he threads his fingers into her hair and pulls her into a hug. "Thank you."

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

She pulls back, clears her throat. "Always.” He watches her slip back into the tent, and he remembers loving her so much, has waited for that to come rushing back, and yet it hasn't. He cares so much about her, has a strong urge to protect her, to make sure she's happy, but the light that used to build in his chest whenever she smiled at him—he cannot find that anymore.

.

.

.

_She should wake up now, snap out of it. This is far enough. "I have half a mind to go get Henry," dream-Robin jeers. "See how he reacts to his dear mother when she's like this." Regina gasps and her breathing picks up. "Or maybe I'll tell him what you've done and he won't care!"_

_"Leave him alone, please. Please leave my son alone." She begs, pulling at her restraints._

_He snarls as he has every time she's had this dream, dials up the red button with his tattoo glaring at her. She screams, her body contorts on the table, pain rips through her. But she doesn't wake, the pain keeps coming until she sees stars and her limbs shake violently and she can feel it, her heart's about to stop. "Please don't," she begs, sobbing, "please, Robin, please don't."_

He'd run, sprinted without breath at the sound of her screams, and he's a thief, he knows how to pick locks and open windows but the sound had thrown him into blind action and he'd all but kicked down her door. He finds her on the couch in the living room, shaking and screaming. Calloused hands shake her awake, and he would be gentle but she looks in agony and he cannot watch another second. She nearly falls off the couch with the start, her eyes dark in the early dawn light, her pulse jumping erratically at her neck. Her eyes had been wary in the park, but now they look _fearful_ and the guilt that's been in his chest begins to feel like poison. She backs into the cushions when she sees who it is, her eyes still unfocused, her hands slipping on the fabric.

"Don't hurt me, please don't hurt me," she whimpers, trembling. He drops to his knees in front of her, his hands sliding onto her thighs. She tries to push him, tries to back into the couch until he cannot reach. "Please, leave Henry, Robin, I'm sorry, I'm so so sorry, I don't want to die, please don't hurt me," she weeps, her eyes squeezed shut.

He gasps, stands, and lifts her easily into his arms, one arm at her back and the other behind her knees. She has lost so much weight in just two weeks. He sits again on the couch, tilts her head into his chest and rocks her back and forth in his lap as he would Roland. "You're all right, it's okay," he soothes, "shh". Her hands grab at his jacket and her face is buried in his chest, her entire body shaking, and he nearly chokes as she says it over and over, "Please don't hurt me, I don't want to die." She's snorting and gasping and not breathing, and he crushes her to him even tighter.

"I won't hurt you. I won't hurt you I promise, you're safe. Nobody will hurt you."

She hiccoughs, "Henry," so disoriented she doesn't seem to have realized that she's woken up, and he knows of her nightmares, but they've never been like this, never make her shake with fear. At least, not that he's known, and that makes his heart sink anew, because how would he know for sure? Who would know? Who has she ever had to wake her from nightmares and soothe away their terror?

(Someone. Him. She should've--she was supposed to--she's not meant to live her life alone.)

"He's safe, Regina, he's safe. Henry's safe."

She shakes her head into his chest, her hands flexing in his shirt, "Electrici—," she mumbles, growing incoherent, "evil, hurts, please, Robin, please don't," and he freezes in horror with the realization of what must've happened in her dream. _Just punishment._ As if. The guilt makes him tremble.

 _You wanted this,_ he thinks to himself, _you were hurting with betrayal and thought you'd betray her too, knew exactly what to say to do it._ He presses a lingering kiss to the top of her head, buries his face in her hair, but his shoulders are shaking. "I would never hurt you, I promise. I could never hurt you. _Never._ " But he _has_ , she's like this because of him, and if he thought the guilt was crushing him last night then this is torture, and there's so much guilt and torture that he's inflicted on her. Tears slip down his cheeks. "I'm so sorry, Regina. You shouldn't think that I could ever, ever do that to you. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." _Pain is never an excuse to inflict pain on others._ How high and mighty he was when he said that to her, as if he'd learned that lesson already. She's the one who understands that, and he's the one who needs reminding.

"Breathe," he pleads, moves the hand from under her knees to rest on her stomach. It's shaking so violently there can't be much air getting to her lungs, "Come on, Regina, that's all you have to do. Just breathe, take a nice deep breath." She takes a ragged breath through her teeth and lets it out slowly, and he feels it beneath his hand and against his neck. "There you go. Keep breathing, you're all right, I won't hurt you."

She's completely awake now, but barely, still shaking, and she must be frightened beyond reason because she doesn't even try to pull away. He drags the sleeves of his coat down each arm and wraps it around her, cradling her to his chest and tugging the jacket around her shoulders.

She mumbles something unintelligible into his chest between sobs. "What?" He asks. He has to move her back a little to catch her words.

"I hurt you," each word between broken hiccoughs, "works out the same. I'm," she chokes out, the words high pitched and breathy, " _evil_." He tilts his cheek against her hair and rubs her back. Wants to fall apart himself, and his hands are shaking.

"No you're not. You're _not."_ He brushes her hair behind her ear, and shifts her up on his lap until her head rests against his shoulder, her hands now scrambling to hold his shirt. His hands tighten around her back, and he lets out something between a moan and a sob, "That was an unforgivably cruel thing to say to you, and it wasn't true. I promise you I don't think that." _You will always be the Evil Queen._ "I've never thought that. You protected Roland without a second thought. You saved all of us with light magic and then had the strength to have mercy for Zelena when no one else did." He runs a hand through her hair to cradle the back of her head, tilts his forehead onto hers, and he can see she doesn't believe him, and why should she? He's the first adult she'd really trusted in thirty-five years, and he used that trust as a weapon against her, stabbed her with her deepest fears as an easy release for his pain.

At least she's getting air, seems to regulate her breathing by matching it to his, to the feeling of his chest rising against her side.

He raises a hand to her cheek and sweeps his thumb against her cheekbone. "Regina, you saved me from such loneliness. You made me smile and laugh more in a few hours together than I had in the year before that, and I don't think I ever told you after the curse broke and we remembered, but I have never had so much fun arguing with someone every day for an entire year."

She tries to laugh, but it comes out as more of a snort between the tears. The shaking has stopped, and her body feels almost limp in his arms. He feels properly tired for the first time since their conversation outside her office.

"And I'm not sorry I've kissed you," He presses his lips to her forehead, to each of her cheeks, as if to prove his point.

\------------------------------------------------------------------

Regina sniffles, still dazed and weak. She has broken down like this three other times in her life: the first night back in the Enchanted Forest without Henry, the day he nearly died, and the day her mother crushed Daniel's heart, all of those alone, and nobody had held her. She knows she should, must pull away, but her vision is cloudy and she has not slept properly in weeks, his scent surrounds her, and she tells herself _one second more._

She slips into sleep with his arms tight around her just as the sun begins to peek through on the horizon.

The dream does not come back.

.

.

.

Robin wakes to Regina's voice, talking to someone on the phone. He opens his eyes, and sees her in the foyer of the house in a black dress and heels, her makeup refreshed. His jacket is folded and sitting on the coffee table, and from the sunlight in his eyes he figures it must be about seven in the morning. He runs his hands over his face, then stands and walks over to her.

"Get your jacket," she says, "we have to go. Mr. Gold thinks there's some new company in town and there's a meeting."

"Regina," he pleads.

"Let's drop it, okay?"

"No, I'm not going to drop it. You've been dreaming about me killing you?"

She sighs, and she's so different in the harsh light of the morning, her shields back up. "Yes. It's just a nightmare."

"It looked pretty bad to me."

"I'm fine," she bites out.

"Regina, you have to know, I'm sorry for what I said, and I could never—"

She softens, just a little. "I know."

Her cell rings again.

"You found what?" she almost barks into the phone, and he tenses. "All right. I'll meet you there."

She looks at him. "Gold wants everyone to come to the barn where Zelena's spell was enacted. Seems it's a visitor with which he is familiar." She grabs a coat and buttons it on. "Go get Marian and meet us there. We may need to ask her some things about…"

He nods, searches her eyes, and she will not let him, vanishes in a cloud of purple.

.

.

.

Mr. Gold lifts the canister and shifts it between his hands. "This once held the Snow Queen," he says.

"Did you put her in there?" Grumpy asks.

Gold rolls his eyes. "No. Believe it or not, I don't actually know who did."

"Regina, then!"

Regina feels everyone's eyes turn to her and scowls, glancing up at Mary Margaret, and grumbles, "I had plenty of Snow to deal with already, trust me."

Snow raises an amused eyebrow, and Regina sighs. "This one wasn't me." She feels Robin's eyes practically burning into her from across the room, and she has a strong urge to punch something.

"Do we know why she was in the canister to begin with?" Robin asks.

Belle looks at him. "I've read the story. Queen Elsa of Arendelle?" Her husband nods his confirmation. "It was said that she froze the heart of her sister and that she had herself placed in a vessel to capture her magic, so that her sister would be freed."

"But that wouldn't work," Regina says, "freezing the source of magic doesn't stop it. Magic can only be reversed if the source makes it so, or if the source dies."

"Yes, well, whoever put her in there obviously hadn't done their homework on that," Rumple adds.

Belle frowns, "They say she went mad with the loss of her sister, and froze her entire kingdom under snow and ice, where it's stayed for centuries."

"And now she's free in Storybrooke," says Hook, scowling. "Bloody brilliant."

"Well somebody is going to have to go find her and talk to her," Emma says. Well, Regina thinks with pursed lips, her observations are as astute as usual.

"I'll go," David offers.

"To talk to an emotionally unstable woman with incredible power and nothing to lose? I don't think so," Regina snaps. "I'll go."

"By yourself!" Robin cries. Regina refuses to look at him.

"I don't think she'll react well to crowds," Rumple observes.

"I'll be fine. At the very least I'll figure out what she wants. I'm sure my magic is more than a match for her."

"But if she came through the portal with us then she must've been in the Enchanted Forest." Everyone turns to Marian, a bit surprised. "Someone there must've trapped her, or at least gotten the vessel."

"I don't remember seeing anything when we came through," Hook says, "do you, Swan?"

"No," she replies, with an apologetic glance at Regina that makes her want to strangle something, "I was too focused on getting out of there."

"All right. Well unless anyone has something else to add, I'd say that I should probably go ahead and find her?" Regina wants this done. Although she has to wonder if there will ever be ten minutes when somebody isn't trying to kill them all.

"Very well, dearie. She's more likely to talk to you than Prince Charming."

"Regina," she hears Robin warn. Snow starts to walk toward her, and she scowls.

"Fine, we'll trace her together, and I'll just approach her myself."

There are a few nods around the room.

 _The twisted band of villains and heroes at it again_ she thinks, and she wishes, she wishes so much that they could all just be people.


	6. Ties

**_Chapter 4_ **

**The Southern Isles, Bordering the Enchanted Forest, Two Years Before the Casting of the First Dark Curse**

"Marian!" he cries, sprinting to her.

This castle houses a powerful sorcerer and his masters, a rather unpleasant family grown incredibly large through generations and generations of having far too many children. It's a perfect target, or so he'd convinced her, cruel people whose tenants they will be able to feed for years by selling the fine silverware and jewelry and magical artifacts they'd find. They'd be home to baby Roland by dinnertime, he'd promised.

They had not expected the sorcerer's ambush on their way out.

"Marian!" but it is too late, she has touched the barrier of dark magic, and he does not reach her before she falls to the ground. He lifts her into his arms, runs to the door with his men.

By the time they reach their camp again, she shakes more than any amount of blankets will stop, grows feverish and pale, cannot eat or drink. She looks worse than she had when she contracted the fever near the end of her pregnancy, and he'd been certain she would die then. He stands, wraps her in a blanket, and picks her up.

"I'm going to ask him for help."

"Robin," Friar Tuck warns, shushing the baby as he speaks.

Robin will not leave his son without a mother.

"I'm going. Anyone is free to join me, or not. Magic healed her once, and it can do it again."

"But the imp is dangerous!"

He rounds on the young member who'd voiced this concern, his jaw clenched. "So is her disease. Roland needs his mother. I'm going, and that's final."

He sets his wife down on a cart as gently as possible, reminded horribly of the last time they'd done this, and begins to walk. He's too scared to feel better when several men join him, and he will not let anyone take the weight of the cart away from him. It's his only reminder that she's still here.

**Storybrooke, Present**

"Elsa!"

The woman turns, startled. "What do you want?"

"I'm Regina Mills. I just want to talk to you."

"I want Anna!" she cries, her eyes wild, and Regina recognizes the feeling well. _Fear._

"Anna, my sister! Did you take her?"

"No."

"Then how did I get here?" Regina tenses as shards of ice begin to poke out of the walls of this—hut? House? Whatever this structure's meant to be.

"We don't know."

"We?" She looks past Regina to the gaggle waiting in the distance and flinches. "Who are you?"

"We're from the Enchanted Forest. I'm the Queen."

"The Enchanted Forest? But the last time I heard, the ruler of the Enchanted Forest was King Leopold the First?" and the girl begins to back away.

"I was married to his great-great-grandson. Here I'm the mayor. Look I won't hurt you, I just want to help you get back to wherever you came from."

The Snow Queen gasps, "But that must be…over two hundred years! How am I alive? You're lying. You must be lying."

"No I'm not." Regina takes a tentative step towards her. "You were frozen in an attempt to protect your land from your magic. Do you remember?"

"Anna," the girl cries, "find Anna."

"Yes, Anna, I've got that," Regina snaps, then reins herself in. "Do you happen to remember who froze you?"

"They said it would protect her! They said it would save my people. Where is he?"

"He?"

"The sorcerer."

"I don't know."

"And where's my sister? They said if I ever awoke it would be because of her."

"I don't know, all right? I understand, though. I have magic, too."

Her eyes widen. "You do?"

"Yes, and I've done some terrible, terrible things with it. I've lost people I loved." And she feels ridiculous for tearing up, but nobody is here to see. "We'll help you, okay?"

She makes the mistake of reaching a hand out to touch the girl's arm. Ice shoots from Elsa's hands, and pain rips through Regina's shoulder as ice pierces the skin and muscle.

"I'm sorry!" Elsa gasps. Regina raises a hand to protect herself. She knows how dangerous fear can be, especially in someone who's never learned to control her magic, who's been told to bottle up emotions until they burst.

Elsa cowers in fear when she sees that Regina is hurt, and Regina gasps as the ice digs deeper into her skin. _The fear drives her magic_ she thinks, as she sinks against a wall.

"I'm going to contain your magic, okay?" Elsa looks as though she'll jump out of her skin. "Not you, not you, just your magic, until we can figure out a way to keep you from hurting people." She looks at her shoulder, feels woozy at the gnarled skin, and then looks back at the girl, determined. "I'll be all right."

Elsa nods, her eyes wide with fear, and Regina lets power flow from her hands and around the girl, containing her magic so that it cannot be used against anyone else. The girl is powerful, her magic unwieldy, and it takes everything she has to keep it trapped, especially as the blood beings to trail down her arm, but she's determined to give the Snow Queen a chance.

**The Enchanted Forest, Two Years Before the Casting of the Dark Curse**

"Rumpelstiltskin. Rumpelstiltskin, open up!"

Rumple saunters to his doorway to find a familiar outlaw and a few followers. A woman lies limp in the thief's arms, her dark hair hanging towards the ground, her skin a sickly bluish-grey hue that must signify some sort of magical illness. He recognizes her as the formerly pregnant wife of this man, about a year on and looking not so much better than she did the last time they met.

"Robin Hood," he observes, chuckling with delight as he rolls the R with relish, "how's the baby?"

The man stares into his eyes defiantly. "I don't want to talk about him. I want to make a deal."

Rumpelstiltskin giggles, but relents, "What can I do for you, dearies?"

"Heal her!" Robin Hood says, straining as she turns in his arms. This Marian is clearly delirious with fever.

"In exchange for what?" he grins, opening the door a little wider.

"What do you want?"

Rumpelstiltskin considers, thinks of sending this man to steal something for him. But then, he was easy enough to catch. He's a few seconds away from telling this insufferable thief who has the gall to come and ask for help to consider it his gift that he'll be allowed to leave unharmed when the woman's hand slips against her husband's shirt sleeve.

_Interesting_ he thinks as the sleeve rides up a little, and he thinks he might remember…but he tortured this man a long time ago, and he wants to be certain.

"All right."

"What?"

"I'll try to heal her."

"You…what?"

Rumpelstiltskin giggles gleefully. "All I ask for in return is…" and he pauses because they always say yes more easily when it sounds dramatic, "your shirt."

"My what?"

"Your shirt, dearie. That rag of cotton you've got on over your doubtlessly well-muscled chest."

"What do you want with my shirt?"

"What do _you_ care?" he returns, holding out a hand. "Do we have a deal?"

The thief scoffs, handing his wife gently to a large, tall man beside him, and yanks the garment over his head, tossing it at Rumple’s feet.

_And there it is._

"Deal." he says.

Rumpelstiltskin cackles and lifts his feet gingerly from under the shirt, stepping on it as he walks forward. All of the men tense.

"Well give her here, Robin Hood," he says, holding out his arms. The outlaw stiffens.

"I'm staying with her while you work," Robin Hood declares, as he takes his wife back from the man who'd been holding her.

"Of course you are, dearie. But not in the same room. I need," he twirls his fingers through the air around them, "space."

The idiot holds the woman closer to his chest. "I stay in the room."

Rumpelstiltskin giggles. "That wasn't in the deal." His face darkens, becomes more sinister. "Nobody breaks deals with me. You know that, dearie." He makes a show of tilting his head and appearing to think about the problem, "You'll be close enough to your love, Robin Hood. You don't have any other options, do you? To bring her back to—a son, is it? Ah, yes. Roland. To little Roland."

"How do you know his name?" he demands.

"Why, because I know everything," he lets out a short cackle, then winks, "It's part of the job."

The idiot outlaw looks ready to leave when his wife moans. He lowers a hand to her forehead and gasps. "She's burning up."

"Well then let's get started, shall we?" Rumpelstiltskin opens the door wider for him.

Robin Hood frowns, but his Marian is dying, he knows that even if he does not wish to acknowledge it, and he's in no position to make more demands. He steps through the doors.

**Storybrooke, Present**

Robin sits next to Marian as they wait.

"Marian there's something I wanted to ask you."

She turns to look at him. "Hm?"

"About how you ended up in Reg—in the Evil Queen's dungeon?"

"Yes?" she shivers, and he puts an arm around her waist.

"The last time I saw you, you were deathly ill. I had put you in harm's way during a job." His eyes grow glassy with the memory and the guilt, and he pushes a piece of her hair behind her ear to remind himself that she's here, alive and well. "I went to Rumpelstiltskin to ask him to heal you, and he said he'd try." Robin's voice cracks, "and then told me he'd failed."

A tear runs down his cheek, and his hand tightens around her. "I saw your body," he confesses.

She looks him in the eye, surprised. "But…" she trails off. "I have no memory of an illness. I remember being with you, and then, the next thing I knew I awoke separated from you and Roland in the Enchanted Forest."

Robin's expression darkens, and the hand at her waist turns into a fist. "I'm going to _kill_ him," he growls, standing.

"Robin," she soothes, standing and running a hand from his shoulder to his elbow, not understanding. He walks forward anyway.

"Rumpelstiltskin," he accuses, walking to where he waits with Belle. "You told me you failed to heal her."

The man tilts his head. "Did I?"

Robin grabs his collar, and Belle grabs at his arms. "Robin, please." He lets go, fury in his eyes.

"What did you do to her?" he demands.

"Do to her? It looks like I healed her, doesn't it?"

"But I saw her—"

"It must've worked after we gave up. That does happen occasionally."

"But—"

"I don't break deals, dearie," he says, slipping into his Enchanted Forest voice and away from the gentler Mr. Gold, "and the deal was that I would try. You should be pleased; it looks like I was more successful than we thought."

Marian reaches them and puts a hand on his shoulder. Robin gasps, as though in pain, and leans into a tree to stay standing, one hand grasping at his shoulder, his other on Marian's to steady himself.

He feels Snow's eyes on him, but he is horribly confused. She runs over, and she and Marian are on either side. He gasps as the pain shoots through the shoulder and the entire arm yet again, and a pressure constricts his chest. Comprehension dawns.

He runs to the tree stump on which he and Marian had been waiting, ignoring the pain, grabs his crossbow, and begins to sprint towards the icy structure. "Come on," he yells over his shoulder, still running. Snow was close enough to him that she grabs him and forces him to face her.

"What is it?"

"She's hurt," he cries as he throws her off, "I can—"

Snow nods as she realizes what has happened and lets him keep running. "We need to go help her," she orders the group, and then begins to run herself.

Robin and Snow break through the doors first to find Regina slumped on the ground. Ice has pierced one shoulder in several places, and blood runs freely from the wounds, darkening the blue-grey ice. Her good arm is raised to keep the Snow Queen trapped in a corner, but the magic begins to fade as she sees the others enter.

Robin and Snow both train arrows on the blonde, and Regina fails to stand as she cries, "No, don't hurt her!"

"What?" Emma demands as the others trail in behind her. She sinks down next to Regina, takes a cloth that someone has handed her, and begins to put pressure on the wounds. Robin glances at her, at the wound, and the terror in his eyes makes her feel ill.

Elsa looks at them from behind her magical barrier, her eyes wild with fear.

"Don't hurt her," Regina repeats. "She didn't mean any harm." She looks up at Emma, "We'll contain her magic until we can figure out how to fix this, but we don't hurt her."

Emma nods. "Hook!" she calls, and now-- _wonderful--_ the handless wonder is the one holding a bloodied rag to her shoulder. Emma looks at her, "Tell me what to do."

.

.

.

"Would you show me how to heal that?" Emma asks, and Regina scowls.

"No thank you," she says flatly, lifting her good hand to do so herself, but she'd used much of her power to hold Elsa, and as she tries to reach into its source she feels weak.

"I'm going to have to learn sometime," Emma tries.

"And what, you thought you'd use me as a test subject?"

Hook surrenders his task back to Emma, and Regina almost vomits when he kisses his girlfriend's temple before standing and walking away. Nausea is a side effect of blood loss, she tells herself.

"All right, fine. You can try."

Emma lifts a hand to hover over the wound. Regina nods.

"Close your eyes." Emma does.

"Now picture it healing, as specifically as you can. The skin stitching together, the blood going back into the veins. You have to…" she trails off, furious that she's being forced to say this. "It's light magic; you have to use positive emotions." One of Emma's eyes opens for a moment.

"Think about Henry," Regina orders, frowning, "You want me to be better for Henry. That'll work."

Emma sighs, "It's not like I want you to be in pain, Regina."

She scoffs, "Well you should've thought of that before you brought the Snow Queen and Maid Marian back to the future."

"I am sorry, I had no idea that—"

"Of course you are," she snaps, "but then being _sorry_ isn't really the point, is it?" Emma flinches, and Regina can see it in her, the fear that the Evil Queen has been reawakened. She almost wants Emma to live with that fear for a few months, to cower in her apartment awaiting the day when vengeance will strike, and she pictures it for a moment, how she'd exact revenge, what cruel punishment she'd concoct for the daughter of Snow White who's ruined her second chance at happiness.

She jolts as the wound begins to stitch together almost violently. "Gently," she growls.

Emma bites her lip, and the skin begins to come together more slowly. The pain eases.

Regina swallows, and forces herself to speak the generous answer, though each word feels like a barb in her throat. _For Henry_ she tells herself. "I absolve you of your guilt for saving, Savior. All right?

Emma shakes her head. "Guilt doesn't work like that. And that's not what I want."

She sags against the wall of the overgrown ice sculpture. "What _do_ you want, Ms. Swan?"

"Three weeks ago, we were getting along fine. Well, even. I don't want to go back to when I first got here," and she means for herself as well, but she knows they must speak in the language they've always used. She smiles, "Henry was so happy that we were all getting along. He just wants his whole family to be together."

"Says the woman who was going to forcibly take him away from his mother, and who didn't want him to remember me." she spits out. Bringing Marian back from the dead isn't her favorite thing somebody has ever done to her, but she made that bed for herself a long time ago and can't, deep down, see herself pursuing revenge now that she's being made to lie in it. Henry, on the other hand, that's where she feels real bitterness towards Emma, because, though occasionally in a misguided way, she's never done anything but love him with her whole soul and raise him when Emma would not.

She sighs, "Yes, I'm sorry, okay? That wasn't just my decision to make. I don't have an easy time of it either, you know, trusting people."

Regina feels the beginning of a headache throbbing between her temples.

"But I trust you with him." Emma begins to fix the bandage around her shoulder, and she shoves the hands away.

"Let's just…try being civil, all right? For Henry."

Emma smiles at her, and there it is at her fingertips again, the urge to put the woman in a chokehold. _Probably not good for my arm_ she tells herself.

"For Henry," Emma agrees.

.

.

.

"Gold, do you still have the vessel that held her?"

She doesn't even want to know why Robin and Gold are currently locked in a staring contest that would befit small children better than two grown men.

"Gold!"

"Yes, I do," he responds without breaking his glare. "Why?"

"I think I might recognize it, actually."

That gets his attention. "Really?"

"Will you two stop, _please,"_ David orders, forcing Robin to turn away.

"Bygones, and all that," Rumple says, and Robin almost lifts his crossbow.

"Fine," he grumbles.

"I think it was among several things that my guards confiscated from an abandoned camp."

"Where?" Robin asks.

"At the edge of the Enchanted Forest, where it borders the sea."

He looks at her, then Marian and Little John.

"That was one of ours," he says. "We abandoned it because Marian fell ill."

Robin and Regina's eyes meet, and she almost feels faint. She had gone with the Guard on that expedition to make sure the villages at the edge of her kingdom were secure. They had missed each other by days, hours maybe. Had she found him…well, no matter. She hadn't.

"It was stolen?" David asks.

"Yes."

"From whom?"

"A family that ruled one of the groups of islands just off the shore," Little John supplies. He looks at Robin, "We never knew their name."

Belle speaks up, "So they were probably the ones who trapped Elsa. Robin, would you remember where it was on a map?"

Robin thinks of catching Marian as she fainted, of her feverish body as he ran back to that camp with her. "Robin?" his wife asks, taking his hand. He shakes his head to clear away the memories, "Yes."

"You're certain?" Mr. Gold says.

"Yes."

"All right. Why don't we head to the library, then?"

When Robin scowls at him, he raises an eyebrow. "Well your wife's not dead, is she?" Regina flinches behind him. "What, do you want your shirt back? I'm afraid I lost track of it in the curse."

A few confused eyes turn to them. Robin looks at Belle. He trusts her, at least, and honestly, who is he to turn up his nose at someone who's fallen in love with a reformed villain? "Fine."

**The Enchanted Forest, Two Months Into the Missing Year**

"Regina?"

She wipes her eyes swiftly, yanking her hand from the bark of the tree. This man will not see her vulnerable again. But damn him, he always seems to have the _best timing_ , and she can tell by the look in his eyes, he's caught her. She had not expected to be able to sit here in leather pants, high boots, and a corset, and so she's in a simpler black dress, and suddenly she feels vulnerable, almost naked under his gaze.

"Everyone's had luncheon in the hall. I brought you something."

She makes to stand, and he sinks to the ground beside her instead.

She scowls. "I'm not hungry, thief, or I would've come myself."

He sets the plate on the ground beside him with a shrug. "Suit yourself."

Regina opens her mouth to tell him to go away when he tilts his head to look at the leaves above them.

"So, the infamous apple tree?"

"Yes," she says, unamused.

"Were they ever just apples?" he wonders.

She thinks of her daddy lifting her up by the waist to pluck the tree's first fruit when she was young, of Daniel climbing its branches and tossing the red apples down to her, of climbing up after him and laughing at his surprise when she kissed him, confident that the rich leaves would conceal them.

"Yes." She's not sure what possesses her to tell this man the truth. She owes him nothing, yet he has this unique ability to disarm her when she least expects it.

He looks surprised, and she fights to keep herself silent, but she can't resist. "Gaping at the Queen is generally frowned upon, Outlaw."

His mouth snaps shut, but— _no_ —he's grinning at her. "Well then it's a good thing that outlaws don't generally abide by the rules."

Fire lights in her eyes, equal parts fury and amusement despite her intentions. "Fine then," she says haughtily, holding out a hand.

He seems confused, and _ugh the idiot_ his hand flexes as though to take hers. "The food," she explains.

"Ah," he raises an eyebrow, then passes her the plate that holds a slab of bread and cheese and an apple. "That isn't meant to be a witty joke, by the way. There were actually apples at luncheon."

She almost laughs, grabs the fruit and tosses it to the other hand. "Well I am rather fond of them."

"I used to be, until I began to have to devote hours of my life to cutting them into small pieces for my boy. Now I find them rather distasteful." Her face falls. She remembers Henry at all of two demanding that he was big enough to eat a whole apple all by himself, remembers laughing as he tried to stuff the entire fruit into his mouth at once, remembers wiping the sticky apple juice off his mouth and fingers and cutting the half-chewed apple into pieces anyway as he scowled behind her, and that's an expression he'd definitely picked up from her, the petulant scowl.

He kicks himself for bringing up parenting just when he'd gotten her to smile.

"I'm sorry, Regina, I didn't mean to—"

"It's Your Majesty," she corrects, standing. She pushes the apple back into his hands, ignoring the jolt as their fingers brush. "And I'm not hungry."

She leaves him, gaping again, in the shadow of her apple tree.

**Storybrooke, Present**

Regina watches them go; she cannot help herself, and she flinches as Marian grasps Robin's hand.

She hears footsteps behind her until Snow stands beside her. "That was a kind thing, what you did in there," she says.

"Unlike some, I'm not in the business of taking away people's second chances."

Snow looks as though she's going to take her hand, so she makes the decision for her and moves it in front of her body, out of the woman's reach.

_Second chance._ The words echo. She lost her first chance, a man who'd been her whole world, and in trying to find him again, she'd lost herself. Robin, he lost his wife, the mother of his child, and he'd somehow managed to struggle on, to do good despite his loss, perhaps even because of it. He'd raised a beautiful boy without trying to keep Roland away from other people who cared about him, with the generosity to share the love of that child. And here he is, reunited with his Marian, the woman he'd walk through Hell to be with, but of course he walked through Hell without listening to the demons, and she, she walked through Hell for Daniel and became one. This is what he gets, what he deserves for being a good man, a second chance with his wife and their boy, a chance to have a life untethered to her darkness. She sees Daniel's frantic eyes as she lost him, the first and second times, both in stables, once by her hand and once as good as, and she wonders…if she had not grown to be so evil, would he have come back for real? Would he have been able to stay with her, to love her as he had when they were children? But of course he would not. It was as fixed, as fated as the fact that she would not be able to stop herself from falling in love with her soul mate, that she would not be able to stop herself from turning evil at the loss of her first love. She wishes this ridiculous fate everyone talks about could have a face, a name so she could direct her hatred for this mysterious entity, so she could direct her hatred anywhere but herself. _I will not turn evil this time_ she thinks, stubborn as ever, _forget fate, if it even exists_. _I refuse._

She would never admit it, but there's a vein of jealousy in her; she's jealous of Robin. His first love has returned from the dead, a feat she turned evil to attempt and never accomplished, and he had not even tried. She hates herself, though, for the jealousy, for begrudging him even a little bit the very thing she'd wanted for herself, and she wonders how selfish her love for him really is. He'd be better off without it.

But try as she might, she cannot, has never been able to banish a single feeling in her life, not as a girl, not as a woman, not even when she made a valiant attempt at not feeling at all as the Evil Queen, not with her heart out of her chest…and she knows, she is doomed not only to the feeling, but also to the pain of knowing she will have it, forever.


	7. First Love

**_Chapter 5_ **

**Storybrooke, Present**

When Marian hears someone approaching she half expects it to be Robin, but the footfalls are too heavy, too stately for him.

"Would you appreciate company, or would you prefer to be alone?" It's Tuck. He has a distinctive but comforting voice, low and quiet.

"Oh, please sit," she replies, wiping a stray tear off her cheek. She points at the empty spot next to her on the fallen log.

"How are you doing?" He's always the best man for a heart to heart, and perhaps she needs one.

Her lips twist, "I could be better." She takes a breath, bites her tongue. "I could be worse, too, I suppose. You know, dead or something."

He tenses up, and she remembers that her joke might be even more painful to him than it is to her, because he lived through that alternate reality. "I'm sorry."

"No, it's all right." He squeezes her hand briefly. "It must be horribly confusing that we've moved several years ahead and you're, well, stuck in the past and the future all at once."

She takes a deep breath, and the words rush out before she can stop them. "I screamed at him the first night I was back, you know. Absolutely shrieked and hollered and cried and everything."

He bites his lip.

"Oh, of course you know. You heard, didn't you?"

He nods sheepishly.

She grins weakly. "How did I forget so soon what it was like to live with twenty men?" She sighs, looks off into the distance, "I mean, it's enough to take in that it's been years for him when _I_ was just with him… _my Robin_ a few months ago. It's enough that my baby's a little boy now, and I've missed years of his life, his first steps," she smirks, "knowing my husband, his first _heavily supervised, I'm sure_ time holding a bow." Her expression sobers, "Tuck, I might've even understood that he'd moved on, loved again. But my God, of all the women in the world—the Evil Queen?"

He sits with her for a few moments, and they are silent. There is little he could say. "I haven't heard you yelling at him again," he finally observes.

She feels her words become almost helpless, and doesn't know what to think of that. "What would be the purpose? I don't want him to hate me. I don't want Roland to see us fighting. I don't want us to _be_ fighting."

"I don't know if it makes it better, Marian, but she was very good to both of them."

"I don't know either." She looks down at her hands, twisting and turning her fingers together. "I was so excited to be back with him," she confesses, smiling, but then her face falls, "But I'm not. I'm with a shadow of him. Someone so changed by the time between that sometimes I don't even think I recognize him. It's like I've lost him as surely as he lost me."

"It was—" Friar Tuck searches for the right words, "—it was very hard on him, for a long time. It took months before he would let Roland out of his sight. He used to…" he trails off, unsure whether telling her will help, but then he decides it's her right to know either way, "Some days he would cry himself to sleep. Silently, but we all knew. He'd put Roland right next to his bed and hold one of his hands and stare until he was just too exhausted to stay awake. During the day he would take on twice as much work, I think so that he wouldn't be able to keep his eyes open later. Other days he was almost catatonic. He was different when he put himself back together. He still smiled almost as much, but it wasn't as easy of a smile. He always carried a little bit of the pain."

He sees her tears and breaks off. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to—"

"It's all right," she assures him. "I can tell he's different. He is still my husband, though, and I do still love him. I want us to—I want us to try. I know he does, too, but I'm…not sure we can find the balance we had before."

"There is no easy answer to that, Marian. I wish there were." He puts a comforting arm around her waist and lets her head fall to his shoulder. "You and Roland are developing a wonderful relationship," he says, to ease the burden, and it does.

"Yes," he can hear the smile in her voice, "we are. Thank you Tuck," she whispers. "You've always been like a big brother to me. A sensitive big brother who listens better than most."

"You're welcome."

"Will you sit here with me for a while?" He squeezes her shoulder.

"Of course."

**The Enchanted Forest, Four Years Before the Casting of the First Dark Curse**

"Robin."

"Hm?" he turns to her as they walk, a hundred feet or so behind the rest of the Merry Men.

"I have something important I need to tell you."

She has his full attention now, his brow furrowed, and he stops walking. "Are you all right?"

"Yes, I'm—," she smiles, takes one of his hands and rests it on her belly, "I'm pregnant."

It takes a moment to register. "You're—" a joyful laugh as he bites his lip, grins, gathers her in his arms.

He pulls back, cradles her face in his hands, kisses everywhere, quick kisses to her forehead and cheeks and jaw until she's giggling and pushing him away at his shoulders. He drops to his knees, kisses her stomach, and her hands come to thread through his hair.

"You're certain?" he asks as he stands again.

She laughs, throws her head back. "Yes."

His fingers tangle in her long hair as he kisses her, strong and warm and over far too soon. "I love you," he says, cradling the back of her head.

She raises a hand to his jaw. "As I love you."

He's grinning again, and it's infectious, the joy swelling between them. Robin puts a gentle hand on her stomach, "And I love our little girl."

Marian tugs his hand and they begin to walk again, now perhaps a quarter of a mile behind the group. "A girl, is it?"

Robin nods. "A little girl with your compassion and my cheek. Can you imagine?"

And she doesn't know how, but she just knows, _knows_ that he's wrong. Mother's instinct, perhaps. She shakes her head. "We'll see."

.

.

.

Robin cries when the midwife puts the baby in his arms, actually _weeps_ as he kisses Marian's forehead and holds out a finger for his son to grip.

"You were right," he says, smiling at his new family.

"Hm?" she asks, her mind still fuzzy, her muscles spent.

"A boy."

She raises a tired arm towards him, and he gets the idea, sinks onto the bed beside her. She uses one hand to push the blanket back so she can see their baby's face. "Hello Roland," she whispers.

He kisses the side of her head, and soon all three of them have fallen asleep together.

**Storybrooke, Present**

"You look so worried," Marian says as he enters their tent at the end of the day. His shoulders are slouched forward, his jaw tight, and she can see him fighting for control over his features.

"These past few days have brought up some bad memories," he explains, offering her a weak smile.

She steps towards him. "I'm here now. I'm all right. Roland is all right."

He nods, and again he wishes for the joy to swell within him at those thoughts, for it to push everything else out of his mind until nothing exists but their happiness, their togetherness. The feeling does not come. As he stands, Marian takes another step towards him. He reads her intentions a few seconds before it happens. He does not stop her.

Marian tentatively presses her lips to his, closed at first. When he doesn't pull away, she brings her hands up to his jaw, slowly, carefully. His hands come to rest on her waist, and that makes her bolder. She opens her mouth against his, steps closer to his body, threads her hands through his hair.

He opens his mouth slowly, and that is all the encouragement she needs to press her body into his. She expects, waits for his arms to tighten around her waist, for him to smile into the kiss as he always does. He seems almost passive though, stands with his hands on her waist and lets her kiss him. A hand comes up to her neck, and she hears a strangled groan that she tells herself is of pleasure before he's finally, finally kissing her back.

His movements are harsher and quicker than she remembers, and she thinks, relieved, _he has missed me_ , pulls him closer with a hand at his elbow, and sinks onto the bed. He follows her, sits beside her and keeps that hand on her neck. That is something he has not often done before.

She ignores it at first, when she begins to lean back and tries to bring him with her. He follows her, but he lines his body besides hers, not above it, and he is not grinning as she is used to him doing. "Robin?" she finally asks, putting her hands on his shoulders so she can put some distance between them and see his face. He looks— _frightened—_ "Robin you're shaking." The hands on her waist freeze for a moment, but he cannot control it.

Marian pushes him to sit up and does the same. "I'm sorry," he says, looking straight into her eyes, but the shaking has not stopped. She pulls his head into her collarbone, strokes a hand through his hair, and he is crying quietly, repeats _I'm sorry_ every few minutes but she cannot say, _it's okay_ because it's not. It's really not. "Shh," she whispers, and something remains between them, years of comfort, but something else, at least for him, has faded, and she wants it back with all of her heart. She wants him to find it again.

She is glad he has hidden his face, because it means he cannot see her tears.

**The Enchanted Forest, Three Weeks Into the Missing Year**

"What do you want, thief?" she demands, her voice a little angry, mostly tired.

He continues to take long strides until he's caught up with her on the path. The disdain dripping from her every word to him only serves to intrigue him. He's managed to get a rise out of a woman who normally hides every true feeling beneath a carefully constructed veneer. There is a deep pain buried beneath it when she lets it slip, and he feels inexplicably drawn to her, wants to know more about this woman, wants her to know him. "I can't just stop by to say hello?" he falls in step beside her on the trail.

She throws him a glare.

"I think, deep down, you like the company."

She narrows her eyes. "Do I? And what makes you think you know me so well?" She raises a skeptical eyebrow, but her voice doesn't manage to sound harsh.

"I'm still standing, aren't I?"

She glares. "I don't wish to deprive Roland of his uninjured father."

"Ah, well that's very thoughtful of you, Milady." After a moment, he glances at her, "Do you not wish to ride for an hour or two, to rest your legs?"

"I prefer to walk." He's puzzled for a moment; he's seen her in the saddle, and she's a skilled rider.

"Are you—?"

"I don't believe I need to repeat myself," she hisses, but there it is again, the brokenness in her eyes she's hoping nobody will see.

"Very well, Milady." He falls into step beside her. She opens her mouth, most likely to tell him off, but to do so would acknowledge that he's getting under her skin, and, well, that she won't do.

.

.

.

When they stop for the night, Robin sees David and Snow resting by the campfire, and he asks. He does not truly wish to learn anything about her from anyone's lips but her own, but she looked exhausted today, was the only one who insisted on walking the entire way, and maybe they'll be able to convince her. "Why doesn't she ride?"

David sighs, and looks at Snow, who nods.

"Her first love was a…stable boy," he says.

Robin's elbows rest on his knees as he warms his hands at the fire. "What happened?"

"They were going to run away together," Snow adds.

"And?"

A harsh voice comes out of nowhere, and suddenly Regina has appeared at the fire beside them. "He died."

He jumps to his feet. "Forgive me, Milady, I did not mean to—"

"To what?" she snaps.

He meets her eyes, and though he supposes they would look angry to many, to him they look sad. "I did not mean to pry. It was not my place to ask."

\---

She stares at him, intending to make him uncomfortable, but there is something in his eyes—not pity, she cannot abide by pity—but kindness, compassion, _empathy_. Nobody looks at her like that, like they've seen right through the barbs with which she has protected herself for decades.

"I am very sorry for your loss," he says. He feels how easily he could have been like her after Marian died, without Roland. How easily he could have tried to hide from all feeling, good and bad, because admitting one invariably means admitting the other. He sees in her how doomed of a choice that would have been, because it is not a choice—feelings always, always break through.

**Storybrooke, Present**

She tries valiantly again to avoid Robin, but it is a cursed small town (literally, and that would be funny if it weren't so sad) and she was bound to fail.

"Please stop ignoring me," she hears a voice caught between gentleness and anger.

She spins, and finds he's followed her out of the diner where she was picking up dinner for herself and Henry. "I'm not," she says, and she sounds like a toddler even to herself, but this is all the reaction he's going to get out of her.

"Regina we were in the same room there for fifteen minutes and you looked at every face in the room but mine."

"Were we? I didn't notice. My eyes tend to slide right past people I don't wish to see." She has yet to fully meet his gaze.

His shoulders slump, and he sighs heavily. "I do wish you would be more careful."

"About what?" she snaps. She's aching to leave, to get out of this conversation before it becomes too difficult to pull away.

"You volunteered to approach the Snow Queen yourself. You must have known how dangerous that would be, Regina, and your shoulder—"

"It's fine. I have magic; I'm not helpless. Cuts and bruises are hardly my downfall."

"I know you're not helpless, Regina. That doesn't make you invincible." His voice is soft, the words slurred together by his accent in a warm cadence she's always loved. She fights against the feeling with harsh words of her own.

"Did you have a purpose for following me? Other than telling me I don't know how to take care of myself?"

"No that's not what I was—," he breaks off, cuts off the rising anger. "Yes, I wanted to apologize again, for what I said the other day about—" he scratches a thumb against his upper lip, clearly uncomfortable, "I wanted to say I'm sorry. I was angry and hurt and I thought it would feel better if you were hurting, too. It was cruel and foolish, and I apologize."

The distance between them feels like an endless void, though it is barely a few feet. She stares, almost blankly. _I already was hurting_ she wants to say. _I didn't need your help._

"Are you all right?" A hand comes to her forearm.

She shakes him off.

He sighs. "You fight against that darkness, that emptiness every day. I've always been able to see that."

She shakes her head.

"You _do,"_ he repeats, smiling kindly at her. She doesn't want his kindness.

"Not enough."

" _Regina."_

"You've apologized already. Leave me be." She takes a step towards him, not away. She never backs down.

His hand flexes at his side. "I could feel it, you know, when you were hurt. That's how we knew—"

"Don't," she interrupts.

His eyes meet hers. "Why not?"

And she is tired, so tired of saying this, of pushing him away, and of letting him in. "Because it doesn't matter, Robin. It's an echo of a fate long abandoned."

He speaks his next words to the ground, cautious, tentative. "And what about what I want?"

"You want the woman you'd walk through hell to get back. Sometimes, for good people, fate stumbles into accidental miracles. Enjoy yours."

"But how can I, knowing that you are unhappy?" His eyes plead with her.

She shakes her head, _gently_ she reminds herself. She will never again let him see her so vulnerable. "Goodbye, Robin," and she walks away.

**The Enchanted Forest, Four Months Into the Missing Year**

"You look pretty," Roland says with a smile as she enters the room. He'd begged and begged for her to read him a bedtime story, and she'd finally agreed.

Robin's almost echoes the sentiment before he stops himself. He knows better than to think it'd do anything but make her run. Roland's right though, her midnight blue dressing gown sweeps behind her as she enters, its fabric rich but unburdened with jewels. She wears no jewelry or makeup, her hair flows down her back in waves from whatever ridiculous style she'd had it in for the day, and she is stunning. She is beautiful always, but he almost cannot breathe for how _human_ she looks, _real_ , and he cannot look away.

Roland pats the space beside him. "Here, Gina!" he demands. Robin kisses Roland's forehead and stands, as he suspects he must before she will sit. "Goodnight, my boy."

"Goodnight, Daddy."

He turns to Regina. "Go ahead. I'll be back in a little while; I'm going to go speak with Friar Tuck about something."

Regina does not look at him, merely sits beside Roland and pulls a book from under her arm. Roland snuggles into her side instantly. He hears her voice begin, low and warm as he leaves the room.

.

.

.

When he returns Roland sleeps against her, and she is smoothing his curls back as he nuzzles his head into her neck. He hates to startle them. Her eyes shift to him when he opens the door, anyway. "Milady, I can take him from you, if you would like to go back to your chambers."

"No, I'll stay a little while longer. Just to be sure he's asleep; I don't want to wake him by moving."

Tempests do not wake this boy once he's asleep, but she does not need to know that.

Robin nods, then yawns and glances beside her. "Do you mind if I sit for a moment? I've had a long day."

She nods her assent before she can stop herself. They were both awake for hours in the middle of the previous night when several flying monkeys attempted an attack on the castle, and _long day_ doesn't even begin to cover it. The mattress dips as he sits and leans his back against the pillows.

"I worry, sometimes," he says after a few moments, not looking at her, and it almost feels like a confession, like something he's not told anyone before. Robin nods to the pair of them, Roland's chest rising and falling slowly as he nuzzles into her shoulder. "He's never had women around. I know it shouldn't mean anything, but I worry anyway." He looks at his lap. "Roland's taken to you so quickly."

"Robin," she sighs, and she must understand this pain as a parent, the fear that he is not enough. "I don't mean to be…he doesn't need anyone but you. You're his world."

"I'm glad he likes you," he says quickly, "I didn't mean that. I just mean to say—Thank you for how you are with him."

She brushes a hand down Roland's back. "How old was he, when you lost your wife?"

Robin clears his throat. "Barely a year. He won't remember her. The more time passes, the more I wonder if I will. I've forgotten so much about her—her voice is becoming blurry." Tears pool in his eyes, but do not fall.

Regina swallows, not yet ready to share, he can see, but she gives him a look that allows him to see her empathy even without words.

"I should—"

"Yes," he nods, coming back to himself, and he stands quickly, lifts Roland off of her. There's something comfortable but bittersweet about the way their arms brush, all three of them sleepy and warm.

___________

For a moment, she wonders if it would've been like this, if she and Daniel—she wonders what her life would have been, with a man she loved by her side and a sandy-haired child with Daniel's features nestled against her after a bedtime story. She can almost see Daniel carrying their son or daughter to the next room, tall and strong and always her rock, and then reality flashes back and it is Robin standing before her. Regina stands quickly, horrified at the vividity of the illusion.

"Thank you, Regina," he says, lying Roland on the bed and pulling the covers around him. "Sleep well."

Only when she reaches her room does she realize she'd not corrected him for saying her name.

**Storybrooke, Present**

"Are we any closer to figuring out who trapped Elsa?" David asks. He's piling dinner plates into the dishwasher as Emma and Henry retrieve them. Regina would be helping, but she's had her fill of interaction with Emma for the day, and there's a dull throbbing in her stomach she cannot explain that's making standing still more appealing.

She clutches her stomach with one hand as the pain intensifies, grasps at an arm of the sofa, and Henry's eyes snap towards her "Mom?"

"I'm fine," she smiles weakly. The sudden and inexplicable pain lessens to a dull throb. "Gold's keeping something back," she answers David. "He must be. There were plenty of magical trinkets lying around the castle, not just from me, but from generations of collecting and confiscating, but if Elsa's urn came through the portal it must've come to be in his possession, somehow."

"You don't remember making a deal with him about it?" Emma asks.

"Don't you think I would've brought that up by now if I did?" she snaps. Her stomach throbs again, and she leans more heavily against the sofa, trying to sit without calling attention to the action. Once she has, the pain becomes bearable.

Henry gives her a pleading look that she can't ignore. She relents. "No, I don't."

"Let's talk to him tomorrow, all right? Maybe by then we'll know where the urn originally came from." Regina almost laughs at the effort it must've taken Snow to keep Robin's name out of that sentence.

"All right," Emma agrees. Neal begins crying from his crib, and Emma turns to get him. "I'll go," Snow stops her with a hand to her shoulder.

Once she has the baby Snow sits on the sofa beside her and puts him in her arms without asking. Regina almost hands him back, but little Neal decides to stretch and grasp her wrist with one hand, and she's melting. "Hello, Neal," she coos, shifting her hand so the baby can latch onto a finger.

She feels Snow smiling at them. Everyone around her is always smiling; it's aggravating beyond expression, but she ignores it.

"You look better," Snow observes.

_Do I?_ she thinks dubiously. Her shoulder still aches, because healing does not mean erasing the injury, her soul aches, and her stomach, and she doesn't _feel_ better.

"You look like you've been sleeping," she clarifies.

_Ah. Yes._ This is what Snow's after.

"Have you had the nightmare again, about…?"

"No."

"Regina," Snow sighs. Of course she doesn't believe it.

"I haven't." It's the truth. Since the early morning that's still rather fuzzy in her memory, that particular dream has not returned.

Snow searches her face, and seems surprised to find honesty where she'd expected concealment. She puts a kind hand on Regina's arm that Regina cannot shake off without upsetting the baby. She feels trapped. "Why should you give up hope, Regina? True love is the most powerful magic of all."

Her jaw clenches. "Snow, you are as naive as the girl who told you that."

Snow shakes her head. Her faith grates. "I believe in love as much as the woman who taught me the most important lesson I've ever learned."

Regina blinks back a tear. Her voice comes out rough. "Well, she was wrong."

"No. She was happy. It's easy to believe when you're happy. Harder when you are not."

The Queen looks her stepdaughter in the eye. "How would you know?"

Snow hesitates. "You're right. I have never known much of the sadness that you have known, but I have lost people I loved."

Regina sighs, looking around to be certain Henry is occupied across the room. "I killed his wife, Snow. I murdered my soul mate's wife because I was so intent on killing you that I burned everyone who got in the way, and now I'm paying the price." Perhaps she intends to anger Snow, but she should know better than to think it would work.

"That can't be what destiny had in mind for you, Regina."

"We make our own way. I wish everyone would stop going on so about fate and true love and soul mates. Perhaps the universe just doesn't care."

"You _can_ be happy. You have to believe that. If good and evil are made, not born, then happiness is too," Snow says, always so optimistic. Regina clears her throat, and she senses that the conversation is closed. "Hold him for a few minutes, would you? I have a few things to do in the kitchen." The protest dies on Regina's lips as Snow walks away.

Neal yawns then, and she draws her attention back to the baby. "Hello, little one," she whispers, bouncing him gently, "did you have a nice nap?" He gurgles back. She's always loved the way children look at her, no expectations.

Henry replaces Snow beside her on the couch.

"Do you want to hold him?" she asks.

"Yeah!" Henry grins holding out his arms eagerly.

"Gently, okay? And support his head, like this, see?" She cradles Neal's head and neck in one hand and hands Henry's- _uncle_ -to him. Neal fusses a little at being moved. Regina puts a hand near his arm, and his fist comes around her pointer finger.

"This kid has a stronger grip than you did," she tells Henry, brushing hair back from her son's forehead.

" _Mom_ ," he whines.

She chuckles, puts an arm around his shoulders, and kisses his forehead. "I love you so much, Henry."

"I love you too Mom."

Snow calls over to them from the kitchen. "Regina and Henry would you like some tea or-?"

Quiet but persistent pounding against the door interrupts Snow. David opens it to reveal an hysteric Roland Hood, who spins to look all over the room, sees Regina, and runs into her arms.

She had forgotten about the pain from earlier, and for a second when she stands it feels as though someone has kicked her stomach. She pushes away the pain, focusing on Roland as he buries his face in her shoulder. "What is it, Sweetheart? What's wrong?"

He's sobbing so violently he can't quite get the words out. Snow comes up to him and puts a comforting hand on his shoulder. He snuggles into Regina even farther.

"Shh," Regina soothes, rubbing his back.

"Bad—bad men," he manages. "In forest. Mama said—Mama said run here," he snorts, "safe."

The adults all look at each other, the beginnings of worry infecting each of them in turn. "Someone's attacking the Merry Men in the forest?" Regina asks, to make sure.

He nods. "Daddy and Mama are there," he sobs. "Daddy's hurt." Regina's stomach bottoms out. "Hurt where?" she asks. Roland puts a hand to his tummy. She has to remind herself to hold onto him as her arms suddenly grow weak. _I could feel it._ She realizes it's been nearly fifteen minutes since the pain began; he will have lost a lot of blood by now.

Emma looks around. "Mary Margaret, you stay with Neal, Henry, and Roland." She opens her mouth to protest, but Regina and David both nod.

He puts a comforting hand on his wife's shoulder. She looks furious but understanding. "Someone has to."

Roland struggles as Regina tries to hand him to Snow. A sense of urgency begins to overtake her desire to appear calm for him. "I'll be right back, Sweetheart. I promise. You've been a very brave boy, and now I'm going to go help your Daddy and your Mama okay?"

"Okay," he says plaintively, and finally gives in, clutching at Snow's leg instead. Henry runs up to them, and Regina squeezes his hand briefly.

"We'll be fine," she promises.

Emma heads to the door, "Let's go!"

Regina shakes her head. Now that she's acknowledged it, the pain in her stomach is burning. "Not fast enough," she breathes, twisting a hand. The three of them vanish together.


	8. Chapter 6: Light Magic

**_Chapter 6_ **

_*hides* apologies for that cliffhanger_

_So I just wanted to say that I have gotten several messages about being afraid to leave reviews because they're too rambling or too short or whatever, so let me just assure you all that every single one is a treat, from long ramblings about characters to single emoticons, anonymous or not, completely positive or not, so please don't worry! I love and cherish them all! :)_

 

When they appear in the forest, the sun is just setting, the trees blocking most of the remaining sunlight. "Here!" Little John yells when he sees them appear. Charming draws his sword, Emma her gun, and a ball of flames springs to life in Regina's palm.

At least two hundred soldiers in dark grey uniform attack the Merry Men's campsite. All of the men have come outside, the fire around which they must have been resting for the evening nearly reduced to ashes. A few have injuries, but none so bad as the burning pain ripping through Regina's stomach.

Regina grabs Marian's arm as she runs past, frantic, but a bow rests over her arm and she knows how to fight, of course she does. The woman flinches, looks as though she might scream, and Regina doesn't have time for this, she holds on for just a second more. "Roland's safe, Marian, he's with Snow White," and she drops her arm. As a mother, she would want to know.

Marian looks stunned, torn between several reactions, and Regina cannot blame her, but she has to get back to the fight. "Thank you," she hears as she turns away. She disappears before Regina can wonder if she knows that her husband is hurt.

Regina uses magic to throw several of the attackers out of their way, and then runs to Little John as he appears before her. "Where is he?" she yells over the din. David crosses swords with three men at once behind her back. John kicks one man in the knee, throws another off his side, and nods to his left.

Regina whips her head around. Robin lies against a tree several yards off, his face drawn in pain, and pale even in the darkness. He's holding a weak hand to his stomach, and it is blood red. Friar Tuck stands beside him, doing his best to ward off further attack, but they are still so vulnerable.

Regina runs towards him, shoving allies and enemies alike out of her way.

"Robin!" she calls, forgetting everything but the pain and how much worse it must be for him. He must not be able to hear, for he does not react. David follows her.

"Regina, we can't hold all of them off forever. There are too many."

She looks between him and Robin. She calls for Emma, her eyes wild. "Nobody else has been injured so badly. He must have been a target. Protect him!" David and Emma nod, as he goes to stand in front of Robin. Emma kneels, rips off the end of his sleeve and pushes it onto the wound on his stomach.

"Put as much pressure on it as you can," she orders. "I can't heal something this serious yet but I can buy you some time."

"Elsa," Regina breathes.

"What?" David asks.

"If Elsa can control her magic for just a moment, we can freeze them long enough to get out of here."

"Regina, that's dangerous; her magic is unpredictable. You want to free her from your magical binds?"

Robin moans on the ground beside them; he cannot breathe properly and she needs to get these men far enough away that she has time to heal him. "Yes. It's our only chance." She runs the other way, towards Elsa's ice structure about a quarter of a mile off. If she appears in a puff of magic she will scare the Snow Queen, and she needs her to cooperate.

.

.

.

"Elsa," Regina says as the woman opens her eyes. She has released her from her magical binds, all of it taking precious seconds she fears she does not have.

"Did you find my sister?" she begs.

Regina blinks back the tears pooling in her eyes; someone is here to see them now. "No, no we haven't yet."

Elsa bunches herself up against the wall, as far away from Regina as she can go without actually moving. "Your shoulder looks all right," she notices.

"Yes," Regina agrees. "Elsa, we need your help." She takes a breath. "We need your magic."

"No," Elsa cries as she shakes her head, terrified. Regina sighs, fights the panic about Robin because this is delicate and she needs to slow down.

"There men who came through with you; they're attacking people in the forest."

"What can I do, though?" Elsa says quietly, plaintively.

"Everything."

Elsa shakes her head over and over and over. "No, my magic-it's dark, it hurts people. I thought I could be free of it, once, but I was foolish. I cannot escape what it does, what I have done. You have to believe me."

Regina takes her hand. "I know. I understand, believe me, I understand." She sighs, tries not to think about how much this girl resembles her, because this young woman needs to learn forgiveness, hope, her second chance, and that's a hard thing to teach when she has just lost those things for herself, but she knows what the lesson truly is. "The only thing you can change, Elsa, is what you do today, not what you did yesterday. You can change who you _are_ not who you _were._ " _You do not have my darkness,_ she thinks, _you have a chance. "_ You can freeze the men who are attacking," she pleads.

Elsa shakes her head.

"You _can_. Elsa, people I care about, they are getting hurt right now, and you can help them."

It was the wrong thing to say. Elsa's entire body tenses up. "I never wanted people to be hurt because of me. I froze my entire kingdom and my sister. I'm sorry." She hides her face in her hands.

"Then do something about it," Regina begs, moving Elsa's hands from her face, "help people now."

"How?" she cries.

"I'll show you. I'll help you do it, all right? I promise."

"Why can't you do it?"

"We need your magic, Elsa. Mine is not specific enough to—I can't control that many men at once without hurting some of ours. But you can."

Elsa hesitates.

"They may know where your sister is, too," Regina adds, though she fears this sister is not to be found, and if it really has been two centuries, she may have lived and died all while her sister remained frozen in the urn. But Elsa's magic is protective, that's what it does, and she needs to be protecting something to use it.

Elsa sits up a little. "You'll show me, how to use my magic without hurting people?"

_I'll try._ "Yes."

Elsa nods, becomes determined, a little of her fight back, and Regina wonders what she would've been like without her powers, what kind of person she would have been. She wonders if other people think that of her.

"All right. I'll try."

.

.

.

When they return to the camp she checks on Robin first.

"He's doing okay," Emma says. "I stopped most of the bleeding, but I still cannot heal—"

"I'll do it," Regina interrupts her. "As soon as we're done, I'll do it."

She stands Elsa just outside the fray. "Identify the people you want to protect," she explains. "No," she shakes her head when Elsa begins to look around. "In your mind. Think of the people who you want safe, and imagine the rest of them being held still, imagine your power flowing safely through the people you're protecting, and attacking the people you don't want to. Like…" she searches for a metaphor that will explain how the power works, though all power is different, "like lightning. You want the attackers to be hit, and you want it to jump past everyone else."

Elsa nods, squeezes her eyes shut tight. Regina puts her hands on her shoulders and lowers them. "Relax," she says. "You're all right. You can do it."

Her first attempt fails; it does not hurt anyone, it does nothing.

"You have to want it," Emma says from beside them, her hands still hovering over Robin, a soft glow emanating from her that keeps him breathing, labored breaths, but breathing nonetheless. "You can't be afraid of it. You have to want it."

Elsa's eyes flutter shut, and she tries again, raising her hands. A ring of blue emanates from her hands and into the woods, slicing through the trees and the fight. Regina falls back as the wave hits her; she was too close, but Elsa does not notice and she hurts nobody else. David looks to them as the two men he was fighting freeze, their swords halted mid-air. Around the trees and the clearing, everyone quiets in awe as the men freeze.

"You did it," Emma breathes.

.

.

.

Regina stands, dazed but conscious, and stumbles towards Robin. She must heal him; she must get to him.

"Regina!" she thinks he must be trying to cry out, but his lungs will not let him, and the sound is strangled, uncertain. "Are you all right?"

Emma backs out of the way.

He's staring at some point on her forehead, which she touches, and when she pulls her hand away there is blood. "I'm fine," she shakes her head, though it aches a little at the movement. She drops to the ground beside him. "You—" The ache in her own stomach eases, and she does not have time to consider whatever magic is behind that, but she has the vague thought that its purpose is to work long enough to tell them when they need each other, to warn them that they need to find each other, which is ridiculous and sappy and not at all something she can believe in, and also sounds far too much like the two idiots.

He's tugging the scarf free from his neck, and her brow furrows. "What are you doing?" she gasps, tugging his jacket open so she can see how bad the injury is. Blood has soaked through his shirt on one side of his abdomen, the shirt, then skin, then muscle torn by a deep blade wound. She bites her lip hard to stay calm. His hand, meanwhile, has slowly come to press his scarf against her head, as hard as his weak muscles will allow him.

"It's nothing," she scolds, closing her hands over his and lowering them back down so that he puts pressure on his own wound. She was not lying, at least not completely—her head throbs, but wounds there bleed much more than their severity would seem to entail, and she'll be fine. "Let me see?" she breathes. He takes a shuddering breath and lifts his hands, watches as she pulls his shirt aside.

She fights back a gasp—the cut is deep and he has been bleeding for a long time—she needs to be calm, she reminds herself, to fix this. Her fingers hover over the wound. "Can I use magic to heal it?" He hates magic, abhors it, though he has never told her why. She had suspected it had something to do with how he lost his wife, and now she does not know what to imagine as the cause. If he refuses she will heal him anyway.

"Yes," he whispers. He trusts _her_ magic, she thinks, how foolish. A spell of quiet has fallen between them, and she almost cannot survive the intensity of it, she needs to be able to focus.

Regina turns to look over her shoulder, and Marian is running towards them. "Marian," Friar Tuck calls, "here". His wife runs even faster.

.

.

.

Behind her, Elsa cries out as a red-haired girl jumps into her arms.

"Elsa!" she cries.

"Anna," Elsa laughs tearfully. "Where did you come from?"

"I don't know," she laughs. "We were—Hans told us you were gone, and then he froze us…we just awoke here in the forest."

Elsa hugs her tighter.

"You can control your magic!" Anna says.

"Yes," Elsa agrees. "A little."

"But that's amazing!"

"We?" Elsa asks, putting her hands on her baby sister's cheeks.

"They got Kristoff as well; he was with me."

"Is he here?"

"I'm here!" he calls, running up from behind them.

Anna drags him down into the hug.

"I never thought I'd see you again," Elsa says, and her whole body relaxes. "Either of you."

.

.

.

"Robin," Marian sighs, dropping to her knees beside Regina.

"Roland?" he coughs.

Regina lets Marian answer. "He's safe."

Robin sighs his relief, but his lungs rattle.

"Can you help him?" Marian asks.

Regina finally looks at her. "Yes." She turns to Robin, "This will be painful," she says, and she hates the single tear that has escaped onto her cheek, "but you'll be all right. You'll be fine." She cannot shake the feeling that Robin's not the one she's trying to comfort.

"Not more painful than it is now," he gasps, his hands clenching into the dirt.

_It will be_ she thinks, but she will not tell him that. She turns to Marian. "Hold his head steady and a little elevated, so he can keep breathing while I heal this," she requests, "and he'll probably want something to hold onto."

Marian moves over, lifts his head into her lap with her legs crossed and takes one of his hands in hers, rests the other against his jaw.

"Do you need anything?" Friar Tuck asks.

"A clean bandage, for when I'm done. And fresh clothes for him," Regina says. "How long has it been?" she asks Marian, thinking through what she must fix first with the healing magic, how long ago it was that she began to feel the pain.

"Half an hour, perhaps?" Marian answers, smoothing her fingers against his jaw as he begins to cough again. "Shhh," she soothes, and then looks back at Regina. "Since I saw him last, anyway. I didn't see it happen."

She'll return some of the blood to his veins, then, before she begins to stitch the lacerations back together.

He flinches as the magic flows from her hand and onto his wound, at first, she thinks, in pain. Then she sees that he is looking at the stream of magic. She knows she should not be surprised, but the magic healing him is blinding, blinding white. Dark magic comes from hate; light, from love, and healing the man she was destined to be with is clearly an act of the latter, but somehow the physical reminder of the feelings they've both been trying to ignore unsettles her, makes her simultaneously nauseous with guilt and warm with affection.

He gasps, his abdomen lifting off the ground as the magic sears through him, closing broken veins and tissue, and the hand that was on the ground reaches out, lands on Regina's arm, grasping tight to her.

She glances at Marian, at the thoughtful look she's giving her, then squeezes his hand and puts it back by his side.

"Take slow breaths if you can," she orders, lifting her hand a little higher. She closes her eyes and pictures the blood flowing back through his veins, the veins knitting back together in the right order, large to small, the muscle closing up, the skin after it. She wills the magic to close up the worst of the wound, to return proper blood flow and heal his organs so that his lungs can take in enough air. She feels the power flow through her and into him, light magic, positive thoughts, imagines that smirk on his face instead of the pain, the hand that had reached for her strong and not weak. When she healed before, with dark magic, it had been with feelings of hatred for the person who had inflicted the wound. This fills her with such a different focus. It hurts, though; it aches to fill herself with love for him. It hurts to force herself to remember, and to want.

She cannot focus on that, she reminds herself. Focus on him, good, kind Robin, made strong enough to carry his son again. She thinks of the look on Roland's face when he sees his Papa all better, the smile and the joy and she reaches for that, as the magic grows stronger.

When she opens her eyes Marian is staring at her, and Robin's eyes are shut. She sighs in relief as she hears him take a long and sturdy breath, the sound no longer rattling or halting. "Stay still," she warns, as she looks at his stomach. A long, angry red scar runs for several inches just beside his navel, but only his shirt and jacket show traces of blood.

"Thank you," Marian gasps, looking as well.

Regina slams her eyes shut for a moment, turns her face towards the sky, and then looks to Marian, fighting the urge to look at him. "Let's help him sit."

Marian takes hold of one of his shoulders, Regina the other, and they pull him up together to lean against the bark of a tree. Regina lets go right away, but she cannot help the soft smile she gives him as he opens his eyes and the light there returns, replacing the pain. He looks pale and exhausted but _alive_ and that is blessing enough for all of her own pain.

He glances down at the wound, runs his fingers lightly over the scar. "That's incredible," he breathes.

"You'll be sore for a week or so. And you need to rest; you still lost a lot of blood," she warns.

"Yes," he sighs, tilting his head against the tree behind him and reveling in each deep breath.

David comes over to them, closing his cell phone after calling Snow. "Are you all right?" he asks Robin.

Robin nods and bends his knees as if to get up. "No, don't try to stand yet," Regina argues, standing herself. Her head throbs. "Give yourself a few more minutes."

"We're going to move the Merry Men to Granny's for the time being," David tells them, "where they will be safe and closer into town."

Regina's fist clenches-now there will be no avoiding them-but he's right; that will keep them safer.

"I'll drive you," David offers Robin and Marian. "I'll go get my car now and come back for you."

"All right," Marian agrees. She calls after Regina just as the woman begins to leave. "Ride with us?" she offers. "You must be exhausted."

Regina's back is to them, and she briefly considers pretending she had not heard, then just as quickly rejects such a childish reaction. "No, I wouldn't want to--" She gives Marian a tight smile. "I'm going to go pick up Henry, and Roland as well. I'll bring them to you at Granny's. Robin can change clothes, then, before Roland sees-"

"All right," Marian agrees, glancing down at Robin, who looks half-asleep against the tree.

Regina looks to David. "Let's walk everyone who isn't injured back into town now. As quickly as we can."

"Yeah, all right. How long do we have before they, err, unfreeze?"

"Twenty-four hours, perhaps. No more than that." Regina answers. "Were there any other severe injuries?"

"No," David says. "We were lucky."

"Or they were after me," Robin groans, blinking his eyes half-open as he pushes himself to sit up further. "They went straight for me when they got here. That doesn't seem like a coincidence."

Marian looks at him. "Why would they do that?—Robin don't try to stand, please."

"Your wife's right," Regina agrees, ignoring the way she almost chokes on the second word as it leaves her mouth. When he next looks at Regina, it feels as though his eyes reach for her.

Regina takes a deep breath. "We'll discuss this at Granny's. Elsa's family has appeared along with whoever these men are. Perhaps they can shed some light on this." She turns to walk, the exhaustion of using so much magic—and she would not admit it, but the emotional exhaustion as well—catching up with her. David grabs her at the elbow when she starts to stumble. She lifts her arm away from him immediately. "Let's go."

She hates the way he hovers just a little for the rest of the walk into town, but at least he does not argue or do something ridiculously Snow-like and offer her help.

.

.

.

"Daddy!" Roland cries the minute he enters the diner. Robin kneels from his chair as quickly as he can with his still-sore injury, and Roland crashes into him before the door has swung shut behind Snow, Neal, Regina, and Henry, tears wetting his cheeks. "Daddy you're okay."

"Yes, I am," Robin agrees, kissing the side of Roland's head, rubbing a hand up and down his back. "I'm all right."

"I was _scared_ ," Roland confesses, pulling back to smash his father's cheeks between his little hands.

"I'm all right, my boy," he comforts, his voice muffled by Roland's hands. "Look," he says, "I'm not hurt anymore." He takes one of Roland's hands and moves it to his stomach, which aches but bears only a scar line that the boy cannot see and no other mark of his injury.

Roland moves his hand gently, “But—"

Robin brushes Roland's curls off his forehead. "Regina healed me," he explains.

Roland's eyes go wide. "With magic?" he asks, turning around to look for her.

"With magic," she says. He looks to his mother beside her. "Did you see?"

"Yes," Marian answers, her voice thick.

Roland lets go of his father and glances between him and Regina. Robin nods, "Go ahead."

Roland spins around and runs to Regina, hugging her legs and burying his face in her thigh. She puts an arm around him hesitantly at first, but when Marian does not object she lifts him up to give him a hug. "You saved Daddy just like you saved me from the monkeys in the Enchanted Forest, 'Gina," he says snuggling his face into her neck.

"Mm-hm," she agrees, shifting him up on her hip so she can hold his weight. She brushes his nose with one finger. "I will always protect you both."

"And Mama?" he asks innocently, God, so innocently and only by an accident of fate is Marian here for him to know and not dead by her own hand.

Everyone in the room tenses, Marian especially, and Regina fights against the stabbing guilt in her chest. "And your mama," she says, her voice gravelly but gratifyingly not breaking, and she will not look at Robin, she will not, but can tell his son this truth. She kisses Roland's forehead. "Why don't you go see her for a little while, all right? I'm sure she wants to see that you're okay."

"But I _am_ okay," he declares.

"Mamas like to see that for themselves," she explains. She hopes her voice does not sound as strained to him as it does to her. She needs to leave, to be alone for a few moments and put herself back together or she will break and be of no use when they have to start planning for this new threat.

"Okay," he sighs after a moment.

She passes Roland over to Marian and slips away to a back corridor, kissing Henry's forehead as she goes. She shakes her head at Snow as she walks past. _Alone_ , that's what she deserves, and they should all leave her to it.

.

.

.

Regina jumps when she feels a hand on her back.

"Are you all right?" He's right beside her ear, the words molten and a little slurred together with his accent, as they always are when he's concerned. She turns around from where she's been staring out the dark window at the end of the back corridor, everything around her that unnatural green paint color she's grown to hate, and she feels bizarrely focused on the detail—honestly what possessed cursed Granny to paint the hall the color of granny smith apples? Did the curse magic see it as some sort of sick joke?

She turns around slowly, and for a moment she feels the truthful answer shining in her eyes despite her attempts to distract herself, and she can do nothing to hide it. _No, I'm not all right._

Her hands shove his off weakly. "Go back to your family, Robin," she begs, her voice tired.

Robin's fist clenches with the urge to reach for her, to embrace her, to do anything to ease the pain in her eyes. He looks at the dried cut on her forehead. "`Why don't you heal yourself?" he wonders, his hand lifting until it hovers at the height of her neck before he thinks better of it and lowers it back to his side.

"I'm fine," she repeats. She has said that to him so many times before. And, as before, he sees right through it.

"You're clearly not."

"Robin, you don't have the right to—"

"You're right, you're right, I'm sorry," he meets her eyes. All they ever do now is apologize to each other. "Thank you for healing me. And for Roland."

Her face softens ever so slightly, "of course," then darkens into a furrowed brow and not meeting his eyes, _no amount of healing will make up for how you hurt them_ , "Now go."

He opens his mouth as if to say something, and for a second that seems to stretch on for minutes, she wishes he would say something else, anything else to her. He does not.

Robin gives her a tight, sad smile that looks nothing like a smile, turns, and leaves her, his steps agonizingly slow. From his injury, she has to imagine. She will not allow herself to hope or to worry that he might be hesitating for her.

.

.

.

"You look like you could use someone to talk to." David sinks to the ground outside the diner beside Robin. He hands him a small glass of amber liquid. "Or maybe this," he adds.

"Whiskey?" Robin observes as he sniffs it, and his hands shake a little as he takes the glass.

"Yeah." David glances at him, flummoxed by the suddenly strained look on Robin's face.

Robin leans back against the building, his free hand on his knee. "I'm not sure what there is to talk about. No matter what I do I've already hurt everyone I care about, and I will end up hurting all of them more."

"Yeah," David looks at the distance. "Been there. I mean, it was caused by the Dark Curse, but it certainly felt real at the time."

Robin glances at him, a sort of hopeful question in his eyes.

"Regina's curse gave me another wife, memories of a life with her, and Snow and I-Well, we couldn't stay away from each other, I suppose, but all that did was turn the whole town against her and make both of us miserable."

"But you were cursed."

"Yeah."

Robin glances at the whiskey, then downs half of it in one gulp. "I have no such excuse."

"You're also much less of a mess than I was."

"Am I? I don't feel like it."

"Go slowly," David says. "That was my mistake, rushing into things. But don't ignore your heart either; it won't help anyone in the end if you're lying to yourself, and to the people around you."

Robin tosses back the rest of his drink.

"I'll give you some time." David clasps Robin's shoulder, stands, and heads back inside.

.

.

.

Robin nods at David as he re-enters the diner twenty minutes later. "Marian's putting Roland to bed," John says to him as he walks by the men, who are setting up sleeping bags on the floor. "There aren't enough beds for all of us," he explains. "We gave two rooms to Elsa and her family, and we thought Roland should have a real bed, and be somewhere away from all this noise."

"Yes, thank you," Robin agrees.

When he reaches the room, Roland is sitting on Marian's lap, drifting off as she reads him a story.

"Hello, Daddy," he mumbles.

"He was refusing to fall asleep until you said goodnight," Marian explains.

This situation is so complicated, Robin thinks, but as he presses a kiss to Roland's forehead, and then to Marian's, he feels so grateful that, no matter what happens, this mother and child have a chance.

"Goodnight, my boy," he says.

Roland's asleep in moments. Marian stands, shifts him into bed and pulls the covers over him, tucking his stuffed monkey into his arms.

"We should talk," she says, still looking at Roland rather than her husband. "Not this minute, necessarily. I don't mind if we don't talk tonight. But we should sit down together and talk."

"Yes," Robin agrees quickly.

"You stay with him and rest," Marian offers. "I'll be back in a little while. There's someone I want to talk to, and your stomach must still ache."

"Thank you," Robin sighs, sinking onto the bed.

"All right." She squeezes his hand, gives Roland one more kiss on his forehead, and steps out of the room, closing the door quietly behind her.

.

.

.

"May I, Your Majesty?" Marian asks.

"Regina," she corrects automatically, turning to face her.

Marian slides into the booth across from her, puts on a brave face, shakes her head. "You're so different here."

"Yes." Marian flinches, and Regina didn't mean for the word to come out so harsh, but she hopes the woman has something more enlightening to say.

"I understand you better than you think," Marian finally continues.

Regina's eyes flick up. "What?"

"The darkness, before, the great and terrible Evil Queen," Regina shifts in her chair, and she can only imagine how horrified that version of herself would be at feeling unsettled by a peasant woman, "I cannot imagine it. But here, you are a woman, a mother. You love my boys. I can understand those things."

Regina does not bother arguing with the word love, though it feels like an accusation.

"Roland loves you very much," Marian adds; she seems to sense the hesitation.

"Children love easily," Regina says dismissively.

"Yes," Marian agrees, looking at her hands, her voice grown quiet and almost flat, "but Robin does not." She meets Regina's eyes again, "He lets the people he loves into his heart completely, and rapidly, but there are only a very few." She tilts her head. "And so it is with you, I believe. You are more similar in that than you realize." Marian smiles, lost in memories, of their courtship, Regina imagines, feeling ill with jealousy or guilt or both, "He can be so infuriatingly persistent when he wants something. It is what makes him a brilliant thief as well."

Regina barks out a laugh, a harsh, broken sound. "Marian your husband stole jewels to feed thousands. I stole lives to exact vengeance."

"Is that what it was for?"

"Yes," Regina bites out. They are not having this conversation. She is not having this conversation, not with Robin's wife, not with anyone, and she wonders what naively charitable life story he has given her, but it is not the truth. "I'm sorry for what I did to you. What I was…going to do to you, before they brought you here. I really am."

She sees it in Marian's eyes, the instinct, and she sees a hand flex as if to take hers, before its owner snatches it back. It would be easier if they were both furious at her. Anger, grief, hatred, she understands those things. Generosity is new. But then, she supposes, thinking of her choice to spare Zelena, it is easy to be generous when you have everything you want.

"Thank you for helping us," Marian whispers.

Regina swallows, and grace is difficult, but it comes, and she meets Marian's eyes evenly, still the Queen. "Love them well."


	9. Chapter 7: Descent

**_Chapter 7_ **

_I'm so excited for you guys to read this chapter!_ _Hopefully lots of plot payoff that feels worthwhile, and also lots of feels. Leave a review!_

**Storybrooke, Present**

Mary Margaret and David slide into the booth across from Regina without invitation.

"How long do we have," David asks, "until the soldiers move again?"

"Twenty hours," Regina answers, scowling at her hands, "perhaps less."

Emma joins them, standing, not brazen enough to try and share a seat with Regina. "We should all stay here until the threat passes."

Regina will not be sleeping on the floor with the townspeople, she thinks. Not that she's been sleeping. But at least Henry will not be out of her sight until they figure out whatever this is.

"Somebody needs to get Gold's ass over here so we can figure out what he knows."

"We'll get Gold," Emma says, nodding at her father. "This shouldn't wait the night. We need to figure this out, now, before anyone else gets hurt."

**The Royal Palace of the Southern Isles, 200 Years Ago**

The brothers take their seats at the table, and they wait for the eldest, Erick, to share his news.

He stands gruffly at the head of the table, sighs. "I regret to inform you that Hans was killed in Arendelle."

Noise erupts at the table.

"Silence!" Erick cries. "I know we sent him to wed the Queen, but we did not realize that she had magic, and Hans was killed."

"What magic?" Albert, the third brother, demands, turning to their Sorcerer.

The old man takes a calm breath, answers too slowly for the impatient brothers' liking. "Magic of ice and snow. It is told that one of the Queens of the kingdom will develop such power, and it will freeze the land. Her land is solid ice, most of the people frozen, including the Queen's sister and her sister's love."

"We need Arendelle's trade," Ferdinand growls from beside his eldest brother.

"Yes, we should stop her!" Albert agrees.

The Sorcerer continues. "Although Hans has failed to woo her, we may still take charge of the kingdom."

Erick turns to him. "Can you trap the Snow Queen? Is such a thing possible?"

The Sorcerer nods. "Nothing will stop her magic from attacking us, but if we convince her we can save her capital, she will allow us to trap her. The capital will freeze over."

"And we will take over the rest of the land!" Erick tells the brothers.

**The Enchanted Forest, Two Years Before the Casting of the Dark Curse**

Marian blinks as she wakes in a foreign room. Her limbs feel stiff, her mouth fuzzy, and the room spins when she tries to sit.

"Robin?" she begs.

A high-pitched voice answers from across the room. "Not here, dearie!"

"Who—who are you?" she blinks several times, but her vision remains fuzzy and dizzying.

"That's not important. What matters is who _you_ are. The wife of Robin Hood."

_The Dark One_ she thinks as she grows vaguely more alert, she knows the voice, and the scaly face is apparent even from this distance and with the blurriness of her vision. "He—please, he stole from you to save me, to save our unborn child, because he loved us. He would never have—"

"Oh, I know, dearie," the man says menacingly.

"Have you ever loved someone?" she pleads, "You must understand."

"I have!" the man yells, running to her. "I spared your dear husband from punishment for thievery because of the woman I loved, and she was taken from me, and now _you_ will help me punish _her_ for that."

"What?"

"You won't remember our discussion, dearie, when you wake. Don't let it worry your pretty little head. But you shall help Snow White, that is your task, and the only thing you will remember when you wake again, in her path."

Rumpelstiltskin waves a hand over her body, removes all traces of illness from her clothes, and puts her back to sleep. Her fever was so high when she reached him, he does not need to erase her memory any further than the last few minutes.

**Storybrooke, Present**

Robin decides to step outside for a few minutes. His nights do not usually include so much noise, such a large crowd sleeping under fluorescent lights, and he needs nature for a moment, to calm his nerves. He may also have seen Regina do the same about twenty minutes earlier, but he doesn't stop to think about whether the chance of seeing her will provide or vanquish that feeling of peace that he seeks.

Henry's walking past him as he heads out. "Hello, Henry," he greets, trying to smile at the boy.

"Hi." Henry nods weakly, once. The hero worship from their first meeting has fallen right out of those eyes. _What does he expect of her son?_

"How are you? I hope you're well," Robin continues, realizes the second it's out of his mouth how foolish of a thing it was to say, _of course he's not._

The words rush out of Henry's mouth, directed at the ground, "Leave me alone," and he's gone, running over to the table where Emma and Hook coo at his uncle.

.

.

.

"I'm waiting for Gold to arrive," Regina says when he joins her outside.

They all are; he doesn't need her to tell him. He walks to where she's leaning against the white fence outside of Granny's.

"Don't you have something to steal, or a family to guard, or somewhere to go to get stabbed through the lungs again?"

He waits, leans against the fence, and cannot help the words that slip out of his mouth. "Why do you bother doing that with me?"

Her head snaps to him. He has disarmed her in a few words, an instinct as familiar to him now as recognizing when Roland's been woken by a nightmare. "Doing what?" her tongue trips over the words.

"Doing _that_ ," he sighs. "Trying so hard to be invulnerable."

"It seems to satisfy absolutely everyone save for you and that insufferable girl I've never been able to shake off," she growls.

"Then why do you try?" he repeats, somewhere between genuinely curious and attempting to get a rise out of her, to get any reaction from her at all besides this coldness. He leans against the fence a few feet away, "It doesn't work with me. It never has, not from the day we met."

"I'm aware." She turns away from him.

He persists, "Then-"

When she next speaks, she sounds tired, disappointed—in him, herself, both of them? "Why do you think, Robin?"

He takes a breath, and they stay silent for a few moments. His brow furrows as he sneaks a glance at her, then looks back into the night sky—it's beautiful tonight, the shining darkness, the stars flicker brilliantly. "You saved me."

He feels her tense beside him despite the feet that separate them. "Of course I—do you really think so little of me that you believe I could wish you dead?" she stabs him with the words, sharp little pieces of her reality, of the nightmare it has become.

"Apparently that's how little you think of _me_ ," he growls before he can stop himself, hears the echo of her pleading with him, _please don't hurt me, I don't want to die_. The guilt has been there since the night Marian came back, but it feels particularly acute at the moment.

"Believe what you want, then," she snarls.

His hands come up in a gesture of surrender. He was not trying to hurt her, but apparently that's all he's good for anymore. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't mean that, you don't deserve that."

She turns immediately as if to go inside.

"I'm angry at your pain, Regina, at your anger, not at you."

She pauses, her back to him, halfway into a step towards the door. "That _is_ me, Robin."

"No, it's not, that's what I'm trying to say—you healed me with _light magic_. I was out of it, Regina, but I could see, the magic was white, not purple."

She begins brutal, feels the words crumple up like burning paper by the end, her face still turned away from him, and she almost hates herself for saying it. Almost. "Did you expect my feelings to perish in the same moment as yours?"

"No, Regina, I—" he stumbles forward, still facing her, his legs crumpling against the white slats of the fence. The thought flits through his head; there must be a rock or a dip in the sidewalk or an abandoned scarf that has tripped him. She grabs him on reflex, her hands snatching at the closest thing she can reach, his jacket— _why not with magic_ , she will wonder later, much later—and she pulls him up to stand. One of his hands clutches at her waist as he rights himself.

For a moment, everything falls away but the contact, hands on each other for the first time since the early morning he spent at her house. His fingers dig into her through the wool of her coat; hers turn white with the strength of her grip on his jacket. Gravity, closeness— _something—_ pulls her into him, forces her to lean, the movement achingly slow, like something from a dream, until she feels his breath rushing across her face. She swallows as her eyes flit down to his lips and back up, swallows again as his do the same.

Robin feels keenly aware of where they stand, perhaps a few feet away from where they'd last kissed. The phantom weight of her hands drawing him closer at his waist encourages him to take a small step further into her space. She's intoxicating, her thick lashes and deep eyes, the vein running down her forehead, her hair falling out where she's tucked it behind her ear.

A ding of the doorbell, the clatter of the screen door falling back into its frame, and reality crashes into them. She drops her hands away from him as though she'd been burned, and backs away.

How far gone must he be, the practiced thief thinks to himself on his way inside, as he glances at the spot where he'd been standing and sees nothing out of place, to have stumbled on air.

.

.

.

"Have you come to gloat?" Regina snarls as the Green Fairy replaces Robin beside her.

"What?"

Regina crosses her arms over her chest, stares stubbornly at the blackness before her. "Go ahead, you were right. I did ruin his life," a hitching breath, "When I decided to run from that tavern, I made myself into the monster that murdered his family."

Tink grabs the fence with one hand, turns to face her friend even though the woman refuses to look at her. "That is not how it works, Regina."

"Really? I could've sworn that's exactly what you said. Selfish, I believe, was the word you used." Regina glances at her, a brief, agitated gesture, then turns away again.

"Yes, because he is your soul mate as much as you are his."

Regina's body lifts into angry, set shoulders and tense arms. "And it's every man's dream, isn't it, to be cursed with feelings for the Evil Queen?"

"You are soul mates, Regina. Two people, and all fate does is throw you into each others' paths again and again." Tink glances back at the door through which Robin had retreated. "Some times better than others. The rest is up to you."

_Maybe it's all about timing_ he'd said.

Regina wants to conjure a hundred glass objects at the excruciating memory, wants to bring back the wine bottle from that picnic and their wine glasses and _anything else_ so she can throw and break them again. She wants red wine to ooze like blood between her fingers, and she wants that pain on her skin to mask the pain beneath. She feels removed from her own body, her own being as she yells, the anger and the pain consumes her, burns through the walls she's been building up, one after another since Robin pled _Marian?_ and her happiness burned to ashes in a single moment. "It seems as though I made the wrong choice long ago, and the universe thought it would have a laugh and dangle the choice I was too afraid to make in front of me for a few weeks. What fun would it be if I didn't get a glimpse of how happy I could've been?" She growls all of it, her voice low and rough and all bitterness, but the sweetness of the memories rounds out the acrid taste in her mouth, and she continues in a broken half-whisper, "Thirty-six hours. That's what I got. With Henry, and Robin, and a sister who might've—A day and a half with all of them, what a fool I was, thinking it could go on any longer." Her voice becomes plaintive, a girl begging a grown up to set things right, "why did you push me towards him? Not just now, but then as well—why did you even bother with someone as dark as me?"

"Are you done?" Tink snaps when Regina's words trail off, growing angry.

"What?" Regina snarls back on reflex, her voice still tired, but the walls start to build up again.

The fairy takes a determined step towards her. "Are you finished wallowing? If you're trying to make me angry, let me assure you that you've succeeded, but the wallowing is pathetic. I refuse to pity you."

Regina's shoulders lift haughtily; she had not expected that. "Don't you want to talk about your precious fate?"

"It is not _fate,_ it is your _life,_ and all I ever wanted was for it to be a happy one."

Regina scoffs, hugs her arms tighter around her torso. "I don't think happiness is in the cards for this lifetime, Tinkerbell."

They wait for several moments, watch as a few flecks of snow begin to swirl in the air around them.

"Regina, Snow told me that she thought you felt it when he was injured."

Regina tenses all over. "Don't you and Snow White have anything better to do than sit around and gossip about my love life? As if that hasn't done enough damage for one lifetime."

Tinkerbell ignores her, continues speaking. "And that he felt yours."

_Telling secrets that are not hers to tell, again,_ Regina bites her lip until it draws blood. "What of it?" Regina's hands grip at the fence again, turning white.

"That is an ancient magic between soul mates."

Like it could be anything else. "Yes, thank you for that scrap of astonishing wisdom."

Tinkerbell ignores her again. "It only works in very special circumstances. To warn a pair of estranged lovers when the other is in danger."

"We are not _lovers,"_ the word tastes like fire, beautiful and destructive together.

Tinkerbell takes a step closer, angry again, but this time a quiet anger, deep within her. "Why are you so determined to think that he does not love you?"

Regina does not back down. "Why are _you_ trying to tell me he does.”?

Tink studies Regina's face, and something she sees there causes her own expression to soften. Regina stares straight on, bracing herself for pity.

"You are afraid that he might," Tink realizes, speaking more to herself than to her companion. "Regina, don't react like this, please."

Regina flinches; she wants them yelling again; yelling is safe. "I will react _however_ I want."

"You deserve love, Regina." Tink refuses to yell back.

"No, I don't." Regina relents a little, just a little, "Henry's maybe, but not this."

"You have helped Elsa, Regina, I've seen it. You believe in redemption."

"It is not too late for her. It is for me."

"Regina—"

"Go inside, Tinkerbell. I'm a lost cause. I was from the moment you met me."

"I refuse to believe that."

"Well I'm not a fairy. It doesn't make me any stronger when people place mistaken trust in me."

Tinkerbell's not leaving; perhaps what she needs is a good scare. Regina conjures flames, an easy, soothing trick that quells the fire inside her for just a moment. "Go!"

Tink shakes her head sadly, scampers off, and leaves Regina to a few minutes of solitary peace that feel much more like turmoil.

.

.

.

"It's freezing out there," Mr. Gold grumbles as he enters the diner. "And it's the middle of the night."

"We want answers, Gold," Regina replies immediately. "What do you know about the urn?"

"Tell them," Belle encourages beside him.

"Belle, that woman there is the one who locked you up for 28 years." Regina rolls her eyes.

"I know," Belle says, looking at Regina. "But she's apologized, and I'm not a vengeful person. You know that."

Gold shoves Belle's hand off his arm.

"Well if you won't help her, help us," Snow says, rising and coming to stand beside Regina. "You told us you did not trap the Snow Queen. Regina remembers confiscating it from Robin. How did it end up in your castle?"

"I didn't say I never had it. I just said I didn't put her _in."_

"Gold," David growls.

Elsa steps forward, bravery in her stance, but beneath it she is scared. "And my family, from where have they come, if it's been two hundred years since I was last free?"

"Something about the time travel must have changed their fates," says Belle. "It's the only way they could be here if, on the original path, Elsa was not freed. We need to know what happened in the original timeline."

Emma looks a little shaken. "But we tried to set everything right! All we did was save a life."

"Yes, well, as we've noticed, everything's more complicated than that," Regina cannot help but snarl at her.

Snow comes to stand between the two of them, placing a quelling hand on Emma's arm. "Do we have something that can tell us?"

"Gold?" Regina demands.

"Yes, fine, in my shop. A looking glass."

.

.

.

When they reach Gold's shop, he pulls out a small, round mirror. He holds out his right hand to Elsa, a pocketknife in his left.

"What?" she gasps.

He opens his palm. "I need your blood."

"Are you trying to terrify her?" Regina demands, swiping the knife out of his hand, "I'll do it." She takes Elsa's hand herself. "Your hands are the source of your magic. We can follow your original journey through the traces it has left." Regina glares at Gold. "We only need a drop of your blood." She drops the knife on the table beside them, grabs the spindle off the wheel beside them instead, and pricks Elsa's thumb. She guides the girl's hand to the mirror, and lets a few drops of blood fall, ignoring all of the strange looks she knows she's receiving. It was the proper tool for the job.

Robin, Marian, Snow, and Charming hang back, but Elsa, Regina, Hook, Emma, Rumple and Belle crowd around the mirror as the great hall of a castle materializes within it.

" _The thieves have taken the urn!" one man seated at the round table yells._

_"Our ancestors have told us our family keeps her trapped at all costs."_

_"The outlaw and his wife, we will find them, and we will punish them and retrieve the Snow Queen."_

Robin and Marian rush forward. "Us?" Marian asks.

_The scene fades, and Elsa's urn appears in Rumpelstiltskin's dungeons, amongst a pile of magical artifacts._

_"You stole these from the Evil Queen," Belle of the past cries at her captor. "She will come after you."_

_"No, she won't," Rumpelstiltskin cackles. "Trust me."_

_The scene fades, and the two men from the round table appear again._ My castle, Regina thinks. _The men have several hundred soldiers behind them, and as they drive their horses forward, they yell to each other._

_"The thief's camp had been cleared out by the Queen's royal guard. The urn must be in her palace."_

_The scene in the glass swirls, and the men have entered her castle at nighttime. She sees them searching through her storage rooms. Eventually they go through a door that she remembers will lead them to her dungeons._

_"Help!"_ Regina hears Marian's voice, and she turns to the woman, but she remains silent beside her. The voice had come from the mirror _._ Regina feels faint, ill, nauseous. The blood drains from her as she stumbles back. She throws Snow's steadying arm off. She does not need to watch as Robin sees his wife trapped in her dungeons; she does not need to watch him learn to hate her all over again; she does not need to, God forbid—she does not want to watch herself come into those dungeons and taunt Roland's mother, grab her wrist and twist it or throw her against a wall or any of the hundreds of horrible things she knows she did to her prisoners. Regina falls against a wall. She makes it only to the nearest one, by the door, the window freezing against her back. She hardly registers it.

"They're taking her!" Belle cries. "Why?"

_"Thief!" one of the men in the looking glass yells at past-Marian. "How did you survive our magical barrier. Where is your husband?"_

_The scene swirls for a final time; the two men and their soldiers ride out of the Enchanted Forest, Marian tied up, slumped over the back of one of their horses, Elsa's urn in one of their hands._

_"We will torture the thief's wife until she tells us where he is," one tells the other. "And then she will be of little use to us."_

_"And this?" the man carrying Elsa raises the vessel up. "We will throw her into her old capital. Our cousin's great- great-grandfather made a deal with Rumpelstiltskin and had her family frozen and hidden in another such urn in the Dark One's castle. We have retrieved them all, and they will all freeze for eternity."_

_The glass fades._

"Those men, the ones who attacked us— _they_ killed me?" Marian asks, clutching Robin's hands.

Regina sags further into the wall. "Regina?" Snow calls.

"I'm fine," she bites back, her palms flat against the cool surface, relief washes over her so strongly her entire body shakes. She feels Robin's eyes on her, guilty eyes, she imagines, and she refuses to meet them.

"I was told I killed her," she chokes out, tilting her chin to the side, and struggling to keep her voice as neutral as possible.

"Well, ya didn't," Rumple says, slipping into his colorful Enchanted Forest voice, pointing with one finger at the ceiling.

She fights it, she has to fight it. "Emma and the handless wonder rescued her from execution!"

"Yes, well, they needn't have."

"I would have killed her," Regina argues, her eyes squeezed shut. She still cannot stand.

David shakes Regina's soldiers. "Regina! Come on, snap out of it."

Those who have been staring at the looking glass all turn to look at her.

"You still have answered one thing, Gold," Robin says, his voice full of venom, blessedly taking the attention off Regina as she shoves David away and stands. "None of that explains how Marian went from ill under your care to…" he trails off.

"My dungeons," Regina finishes harshly for him.

"He led me right to Snow," Marian says from behind them. "He must have."

"How do you know—?" Robin begins.

"It's the only thing that makes sense, with everything you've told me."

Belle shoots Rumple a glare, and he nods, "she's right."

"Why?" Regina cries.

Gold pauses, looks from Robin to Regina.

"I couldn't have you meeting your twoo wuv, now, could I?"

"What?" Robin demands.

"When he stole that wand from me," Rumple explains, pointing at Robin, "I happened to get a very good glance at that arm of his. And when he brought her to me to be healed, I got another look."

Robin looks at his left hand.

Rumple rolls his eyes. "Not that one, dearie, the other one. I'd heard a prophecy, just a little one, about a guy with a lion tattoo and the Evil Queen."

"That's why you wanted my shirt?" Robin cries.

Regina thinks she sees where this is going, guesses darkly, "And so you thought you'd keep it from coming true."

"I did need you to cast the dark curse, dearie. Would've been a little difficult if you went and fell in love."

Marian's voice grows small. "True love, Robin?"

"You haven't told her?" Rumpelstiltskin asks Robin, an eyebrow raised.

"Told me what? Robin, what is he talking about?"

"Your husband and I were…supposed to be together, once," Regina explains, her lips in a tight line.

"Before _she_ chose darkness and evil," Rumple finishes.

Marian opens her mouth to say something, seems unable to find the words.

"And Marian?" Robin demands.

"Well I thought he'd know who had killed his beloved wife, little Roland's mother. That way he'd hate you. Maybe he'd even try to kill you."

"How would _that_ have—?"

"He wouldn't have _succeeded,_ dearie," he cackles, slipping into the Enchanted Forest voice they hear so rarely in this land, "in fact, you probably would have killed _him._ Wouldn't that have been delicious, showing you the tattoo on his dead body, showing you that you had murdered your destiny. Don't deny it; that would've pushed you over the edge into casting the curse. Luckily for me, I didn't need it."

Robin grows more and more tense, angrier by the second.

"But you failed," Marian continues, her voice caustic and mocking, a hand at Robin's forearm. Regina's impressed—she's got bite, even though she's just learned more shocking information about the past than anyone could take calmly.

Still speaking to Regina, Rumpelstiltskin sighs, "Of course she had to be clever and keep her name from everyone at the palace, so he," a finger shoved towards Robin, "would have had no idea what really befell her."

"Yes, it seems Emma and Hook beat you to it," Regina adds, "keeping us apart."

"You bastard," Robin cries. "You lied to me that my _wife,_ my infant son's _mother_ was dead, put her in danger, and then you tried to manipulate Regina into _murdering me_ because you knew it would hurt her?" Robin looks ready to punch the man, or perhaps shoot him with a crossbow, but Regina's honestly almost unsurprised, clinging to one particular detail of his story.

"Why were you even worried that we would meet?" she asks.

"You were rather close to detaining the outlaw who had been robbing from your lands. You would've caught him sooner or later, Your Majesty, and that would've been…unfortunate for me."

"But I was already _evil_ ," she spits out the word. "Would it have even mattered if I'd met him then? As my _captive_?"

The answer comes, quiet and soft-spoken, one of the moments when Gold allows himself to feel some tinge of empathy, "Yes, it very well could have."

She feels Robin's eyes on her back, but she refuses to turn.

Wind rattles the door and the glass window, and a few objects begin to shake on their shelves. Marian props the door open half an inch, and has to throw the weight of her whole body into the motion to close it again. "It's colder," she says. "Colder than I've ever felt."

Gold limps to the window on his cane. Snow swirls through the sky, though it was clear not an hour ago.

"How long did you say we have until the soldiers awake?"

"Eighteen or nineteen hours at the most," David fills in before Regina can.

"Belle, have you read my tome on altered timelines?"

"Yes."

"I don't remember clearly, but—magic, cast in a land by and with people who do not belong to that time and place, what was the effect?"

Belle gasps, runs to a shelf, and flips hurriedly through a chapter until she finds the page she wants.

"What?" Regina demands as Belle's fingers skim down the page.

Rumple throws up a silencing hand.

"It amplifies the effect of the magic."

"What the hell does that mean?" Emma asks.

"It means that Storybrooke is, quite literally, freezing," Gold says.

David steps forward, always both practical and certain of a solution. "How do we stop it?"

Belle reads a little further. "We reopen the portal, and send everyone who is not supposed to be here back."

Robin draws Marian behind him. "No!"

Regina does not realize until she's standing there that she's done the same, put herself between Gold and Robin's family.

"What about me and Swan?" Hook asks, coming to stand beside Emma.

"Only the people who belong to the past must go," Belle reads.

"Including me," Marian says.

"No," Regina and Robin say together.

"There's nothing we can do," Gold tells them.

"I'll stop it," Regina declares. "I'll close the portal after it takes the soldiers, Elsa, Anna, Kristoff, and the winter, and before it takes her."

"You can't," Belle argues.

"I will."

"But—"

Regina sends Belle a quelling look. "I will retrieve Elsa's family, and take them to the ice structure, the center of the magic, where we should open the portal to reverse it."

She turns to Elsa, "You will all be free of your binds this time. I believe you will be able to save your kingdom. You must only learn how to control your magic, and that will be possible with your family by your side."

"We're coming," Robin demands.

"If you must. But you will stay out of my way." She poofs to the first floor of the diner.

.

.

.

She watches Henry for a moment through the doorway, sitting in one of the booths with Roland beside him. Tinkerbell stands nearby, holding baby Neal, all of them guarded by the Merry Men. She does not go in. He'll be fine without her.

.

.

.

Regina explains the situation to Anna and Kristoff. Though the magic Elsa used to freeze the soldiers saved them (saved Robin's life), the alteration of time is throwing her magic into a spiral, and it will freeze all of Storybrooke the moment the soldiers are set to wake unless it is reversed.

When she arrives, Belle is ready for an argument. "Regina, I've read the stories—closing off a portal before everyone who must return has gone through—that could kill you."

"I'm aware."

"Regina?" Robin pleads. Snow, David, and Emma step towards her as well. "Is she right?"

"Probably," Regina answers, though the truth is _Yes, certainly._

"Regina?" Elsa cries, "There must be something else we can do."

"Nothing."

Panic sets into Robin's voice. "No. No, you can't."

"He's right, Regina," Emma agrees.

"I must."

Robin shakes his head violently.

She walks quickly to him, just a few feet away from her, stops the motion with firm hands at his jaw, as tears begin streaming freely down his cheeks. "No," he cries, his stubble brushing against her hands. "You cannot make me do this."

"Do what? It is no choice, and certainly not yours; the entire town will freeze over if I do not do this."

"But—"

"I did not kill her, Robin, but I would have. It so easily could have been me, and I was not lying when I promised Roland that I would protect her. I will not let this magic take her back to execution in my dungeons." She will be gone from his life forever in a few moments, and this contact she will allow herself, just a second more and then she will cut herself off from the agonizing joy of it. They have not touched like this since she kissed him outside of the diner and saw a beautiful future stretched out before them. What a fool she had been. She should have known better.

"You let me do this," she orders, pleads, running a thumb across his cheek to wipe away the tears.

"No," he shakes his head against her hands again, over and over, as though she will stay as long as he protests.

"There has to be another way," Marian pleads, stepping forward. "Regina, there has to be something else we can do." Her name, for the first time from this woman's lips.

Regina looks to Marian behind him, "It's better like this."

"No, it's not!" Robin yells, furious, "you being self-destructive does not make _anything_ better." He goes to take a step forward, further into her space though they are already touching, and terrifying rage crashes into her from his gaze. She has frozen him where he stands. "Let me go," he demands, his voice low and dangerous as it punctuates each word.

She throws a hand around the room, and everyone save for Rumple, Elsa, Anna, and Kristoff can no longer move their feet. "I will. The spell will release when I am gone." His hands dig into her wrists as he tries to restrain her.

"NO!" he cries, his hands gripping impossibly harder, she would bruise if her body were going to be alive long enough for them to develop.

"Tell Henry I love him," she pleads, "you promise me," her eyes falling shut for a moment as she stands on her toes and holds her lips to Robin's forehead, her voice growing distant. "Tell him I always loved him."

Robin shakes his head violently, her lips dragging at his skin until she pulls away.

"You are so _stubborn_ ," she sighs, almost fondly.

With relief, he feels that his arms are still free, and he yanks her to him, squeezes her body to his as tight as he can, and tighter still. His stomach burns, still newly healed. He ignores it. "Not as stubborn as you," he gasps into her ear. The words vibrate on her cheek as his stubble scratches against her skin, _just a second more_ she tells herself as she breathes into his neck.

"When he's old enough to understand," she asks of Marian over Robin's shoulder; she will get nowhere with him. The woman looks frightened, _trapped again by the Evil Queen,_ Regina thinks, _of course she's frightened_ but if she were to ask she would learn she has misread the fear, it is not of her, it is of herself, of the pain she knows this will cause the man she loves, of their inability to do anything to stop this. "Tell Roland thank you for making me smile when I thought I'd lost everything."

"I will," Marian whispers, the least she can do.

Regina takes a deep breath—it is time, there is no reason to delay—lifts the hand at Robin's bicep and twists it to the side, winds the magic around him. When he has let go, she feels certain, he will keep the promise, though he has not spoken it. He will speak to Henry for her. She tugs his frozen arms from around her body and steps back.

"No, Regina, no, _please_ ," Robin begs, panicking, he had thought he could hold her there, she had counted on that, and now he cannot move his arms either.

"Regina!" that must be Snow, she hears with increasing disinterest, she does not need to look to imagine the ugly tears on that girl's face, or to see Charming reaching for her despite his binds. None of them will stop her.

She nods to Elsa and Rumpelstiltskin.

Gold raises his hand and the portal begins to swirl, burning orange and yellow and gold like fire.

It draws in the soldiers, one by one at first, their still forms falling back and coming to life just before they disappear from sight. Anna and Kristoff step forward, their hands joined, and jump together. Elsa sends her one last look-pained and grateful-and steps towards the barrier. Regina raises her hands. Beside her Marian grabs at Robin's arm as the magic begins to pull her forward. Regina pulls the magic up deep within her. This is dark magic, deep purple strands of it that she works into a wall between Marian and the portal. She sees Marian sag a little in relief as the pull lessens, bearable, she can resist it. That done, Regina draws a circle of magic around the portal, dragging its sides together until it begins to close. She can feel it, draining her own life force as it does; she does not have long, she is weak.

Robin's crying; he would be shaking with it if the binds would allow him to move.

"Go now," she chokes out to Elsa. "Go!" A burst of light blue magic from the Snow Queen blinds her vision and when it clears her limbs feel weak, and— _cold—_ she did not expect that, but who is she to tell the universe how it should destroy those who seek to alter time?

Elsa vanishes.

A howling cry echoes in her head, no words, pure pain, the last sound she hears as she falls, slumps into the ground, her heart splintering in pain-his pain or hers, she does not know. Then, dark. Black. Ice. Frozen. Nothing.

_Fun fact: Outlaw Queen endgame involves Regina being alive and well. So take a deep breath. In. Out. Okay? It'll be okay. Next chapter to be up shortly._


	10. Chapter 8: Darkness

 

**_Chapter 8_ **

_I was honestly blown away by the response to the last chapter. Thank you guys so much, and sorry for the wait! Anyway, hopefully you can follow the timeline. I'm beginning about three days after the end of the previous chapter, and then I'll backtrack to what happened immediately after the end of that chapter._

_Please please take the time to leave a review! :)_

**Storybrooke, Present, The Forest**

Robin wanders through the darkness until he finds himself at a clearing, beside the Merry Men's camp, or where it used to be. Perhaps they'll move back, now that—he interrupts that line of thought, stares back into the trees. He finds himself grabbing at fallen branches, breaking them over his knee, piling them in one of the pits they'd dug for fires. He should not be doing this physical work given his recent injury, but he doesn't care; he keeps going until he has a fire suitable for warming five men instead of one, until his knee aches and turns red from the abuse as he breaks the wood into pieces. He takes a match from his pocket, lights it, tosses it into the center of the pile, and years of experience constructing fires have his flaming bright yellow and orange in minutes.

He drops to the ground, his legs suddenly refusing to hold his weight, and he watches as the flames dance, lick at the wood, curl in patterns of yellow and orange and red, and he thinks of how the hottest part of the fire, the most dangerous and most powerful, goes unseen, white, blue, then nothing beneath the warm colors everyone thinks of as flames.

Robin glances up once at a the sound of a crackling log, stares into the darkness of the trees, and he could swear for a moment he will see Regina breaking through the trees with that determined set jaw and those searching eyes that always render him speechless, her legs shaking a little at each step as she walks in heels on mud without a thought for the uneven ground littered with branches and leaves. He can almost see her swiping her discarded coat and scarf from the ground with a blush coloring her cheeks for the first and only time in their acquaintance. He can almost see her walking back up to him and stealing one last kiss, another, another…

_She left me,_ he thinks for perhaps the thousandth time, _she left me, she left me, she left me_ , and anger wells up in his belly, strong enough to scare him. It's so unfair, he left Regina first, but he hates her for it, for how helpless he felt as she took his arms from around her. Just a little less than he hates himself for how he hurt her, and for what she must've thought of him in the end.

**Storybrooke, Three Days Earlier**

When the magic clears, Regina lies twisted on the ground beside the spot where the portal had been. Her form glints in the dawn light, refracting streams of light with layers of icy blue.

Rumpelstiltskin reaches her first, then Snow.

"Rumpelstiltskin?" Snow pleads.

He knees beside her body, feels her wrist, her forehead. "I think," he begins, glancing at the charred circle where the portal had been, "Elsa may have tried to freeze her as she left. To protect her body from the price of collapsing time before it wanted to stop changing. If she did it correctly, if she missed her head, then—"

"Perhaps it could be undone," Snow finishes.

Hope surges through Robin like wildfire, and Marian's hand flexes around his arm as he tenses up.

"What can wake her?" Emma asks, stepping forward.

Gold waves his hand over Regina, watching as the gold magic swirls and settles over her chest.

"It began in her heart," Snow realizes.

"Then, if it hit her heart, we can—"

Robin senses nearly every head in the room turn to face him as Emma trips over the words. She looks at him, too, only for a moment.

"I'll go get Henry," she says, backing out of the room before she begins to run.

.

.

.

Henry sprints into the room seconds after they hear Emma's car pull up. There are no tears on his face, the truest believer, he does not allow himself to doubt his ability to save her.

"Mom!" he cries, falling to his knees beside her. Emma runs in behind him and halts at the doorway. Snow stands and backs two steps into Charming.

Henry leans forward and kisses her forehead. "Come on, Mom, wake up," he breathes, hopeful, resting a hand at her shoulder.

Everyone in the room lets out a breath as the blue begins to fade away, first her hands and feet, then the warmth moves up and into her stomach, her chest, her face, until her skin returns to a pale but lifelike color and her clothes grow soft once more.

"Mom?" Henry asks, shaking her shoulder gently. She does not stir.

"Wake up mom!" he cries again, as he falls down to her forehead to kiss her again. Nothing happens.

Snow kneels beside him and tilts her head above Regina's mouth.

"She not breathing," she tells David, her neck twisted around.

"No!" Henry cries, the tears finally beginning to fall. "Please, Mom, come on, wake up. You can't leave me, _please,_ Mom."

He kisses her hand, and it is no longer blue, but the skin cools his own; she is still freezing cold.

"It isn't working," he cries, turning to Snow White and Prince Charming, his heroes, they've done this before and it worked. "Why isn't it working?" he begs.

"I don't know, Henry," tears begin to fall down Snow's cheeks as well. "Maybe she needs…" Snow trails off with a glance at Robin.

Henry brightens the tiniest bit. "You try," he demands of Robin, his cracking voice on the brink between boy and man.

"Henry, if you couldn't, then I don't think—"

"Try," Marian says, harsh but not unkind. He hesitates for a second, and Marian nods. "Go," she whispers.

Robin stumbles forward to her, falls to one knee. He takes a second to brush the hair from her face. The unmoving emptiness of her features horrify him eve more without the tint of the ice.

Robin leans towards her, presses his lips into her temple. He does not pull back until his lips burn with the cold. They stare at her unmoving features, hopefully for a moment, then in despair.

"No," Henry sobs, falling onto Regina's body, his arms around her,. When he was little she used to let him crawl into bed with her when he had a bad day and she would rub her hand up and down his back until he fell asleep. He wills her hand to move now, anything, anything to happen but this. "Mom, mom," he barks, "wake up, come on, for me. It's Henry, I love you."

Everyone turns to Snow, but she shakes her head, tears on her face. Regina's chest is not rising, the cold has not abated even though the icy color has gone.

"She's gone," Snow mouths to her daughter.

Emma steps forward and tries to pull Henry off at his shoulders. He shoves her back, surprising them both with the force of it.

Robin turns to Henry where he kneels on the ground beside the boy, shock and grief across his every feature, and he succeeds where Emma had failed, pulls Henry off of Regina and onto him. Henry's hands curl into fists as he begins to shove them into Robin's chest, until he's kicking and punching and screaming.

Robin holds him close, tears falling down his own face as well. Snow puts a gentle hand on Henry's shoulder, and whispers, "She was already gone, Henry. There was nothing you could do, she was already gone."

Henry shakes his head over and over, stubborn like his mother; this is not what he wants to hear. "She's not," he punctuates each phrase with a weak shove at Robin's arms or chest. "She can't be. It isn't fair."

"I know," Robin whispers.

"She left me!" Henry sobs, slamming another fist into Robin's chest, knocking the air out of him, making his sore stomach burn. Robin does not pull away; it is of her, the pain, and he needs its weight.

"I know," Robin breathes, a hand at Henry's back, it's all he can think, too, _she left me,_ though really it isn't fair. His voice cracks as he repeats, "I know."

Henry lifts his head to glare at Robin through puffy, red eyes. "Did you even want her to live?" he screeches. Hiccoughing sobs make his shoulders shake, but they do not take the fight out of him, not yet.

"Henry!" Emma cries in horror.

"It's all right," he whispers, shaking his head to keep them back when Emma and Snow and David approach.

He understands the urge to hurt something else, anything else to allay the all-consuming grief. He lets Henry fight him.

Only minutes later, Henry's body goes still with exhaustion, and he's still for barely thirty seconds before he shoves Robin off violently and stands.

"Are you all happy now?" he demands of everyone assembled here. Emma and Hook, Snow and Charming, Rumple and Belle, Marian, Robin, all of them have someone, except his Mom, nobody ever took care of her first, not even him. "She's gone," he sobs, "you can stop trying to hurt her."

"Henry, please," Emma tries.

"I want my mom," he barks out, a broken cry, "I want my mom back."

"I know," Emma sighs, reaching for him. He runs.

.

.

.

Emma and Snow chase after Henry, but Robin stays, knelt beside Regina, not touching her. She would burn him with the cold, and anyway he does not feel worthy of the contact.

Water pools on the ground, and the structure begins to melt away around them. Elsa's magic is gone.

Belle comes to stand behind him, a hand on his shoulder. "We have to move her," she says, "eventually this place will collapse."

He had not noticed.

Robin bends forward to lift her, sliding one arm under her knees and the other around her back. Her head lolls back, her dark hair fanning towards the ground as he stands. The sight makes him weak; his legs nearly give out.

David holds out his arms. "I've got her," he offers, trying to reach his arms around Regina.

Robin resists, clings to her freezing form, tilts her head against his chest.

"Robin," Marian says, her hands at his shaking elbows, "let him help you."

She is not heavy, lighter even than she was the night he held her on her couch, but Robin feels the strain of it everywhere, his stomach aches, sore from his wound and from Henry. His muscles give out, and he lets David take her from him.

.

.

.

They take her to her family crypt, lay her on an empty stone table in an empty room. In the darkness.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Marian follows Robin into the hallway and closes the door to their room behind them.

"Roland does not need to be told today," Robin declares, his voice hoarse, "He'll be asleep soon."

"He won't, Robin. He's awake. Tuck's been taking care of him all day, and I'm sure he could sense something was off."

Robin tenses. "He always manages to fall asleep. _I_ don't think he should know yet."

"I disagree."

"I'm his father!"

Marian grows angry. "And as much as you wish it were not me standing in front of you right now, I'm his mother, and I think he needs to know."

"That isn't fair, Marian."

"Isn't it?"

"Don't tell him," Robin rushes out, "I don't want him to—"

"To what? He's going to wonder what happened, and he'll have to learn eventually."

"I know, I just…" he trails off, his voice quick and harsh.

"Do you understand how unfair this is to me?" she cries, she needs to push back. "I love you, I love both of you, and I was taken here against my own will, to a place where you've both moved on. You are the only parent Roland's remembers. You're trying to force _me_ to comfort _you,_ you want _me_ to make this better for you. You want _me_ to be the one to comfort him that the woman who was going to _kill_ me is gone? "

His shoulders jolt.

_"Robin_ this is not fair to me, and you know it."

"You'll upset Roland if you keep yelling," he yells, Gods he's such a hypocrite.

Her hands ball into fists, and they both stand there, stunned, staring at each other. They never used to yell when they fought.

"I'm sorry," they say at the same moment.

"Go ahead, go to him." Robin shrugs his shoulder to the door.

"I won't tell him tonight, if you think that's best," she relents.

"All right," he agrees, refusing to meet her eye.

When the door once again shuts behind her, he leans against the wall and sinks to the ground as tears begin to cloud his vision.

.

.

.

Tink finds him on the ground outside Granny's, leaning against the side wall. A glass of whiskey dangles from one of his hands; he barely grasps the rim. The honey-colored liquid and the half-melted ice cubes swish towards the edge each time he takes a breath.

"You destroyed her," she accuses with quiet fury, a fact, there is no arguing.

He drops his head down further, staring at his own hands on his bent knees. "I know."

Tinkerbell takes a step closer, so that she towers above him, not done. "Not just because she—do you have any idea how much it meant to her, to have—" so angry she cannot finish each though, and Regina could not have had the chance to tell him, Tinkerbell thinks, she would not yet have been so open. "She believed nobody would ever stay, nobody would ever love her, and you proved her right."

"I know." Robin looks up at her again, angrily, takes a ragged breath. His hand shakes as it drags over his face, his voice grows weak, and he meets her eyes evenly. His no longer seem warm blue in the night; the skin around them looks red even though the only illumination is a distant streetlight. "Please believe me when I say that you're not going to make me feel any worse than I already do." His hand tightens on the glass. "But she wasn't right. I did-I _do_ love her."

The anger sags out of her as she sinks to the ground beside him. "I'm sorry. I did not come here to yell at you. I just feel so… _angry."_

_"_ Me, too." He breathes for a moment, in, out, feels the burn of the cool air against his throat. The winter has broken but it will not be warm for several weeks yet. "I may not have wanted to admit it these past few weeks," he tells her, "but I let go of my wife a long time ago, and we can both feel it, we're no longer…" he trails off, letting his head drop back to rest on the wall.

"Regina knew, Robin, she must've known, that you still—"

He shakes his head, interrupting harshly, "I'm not sure she did."

Robin raises the glass to his lips, takes a gulp, his first one, and so much ice has melted it tastes more of water than anything else. When he lowers his hand and sees the inky lion on his wrist, it suddenly clicks, and he does not know why it did not occur to him when she ran her fingers over the mark by the fire, but this is what she'd seen in the cabin, this mark, this is why she'd run. He thinks back earlier, far from this place, to when she'd dragged him around castle corners and behind forest trees, shoved him against the wall or bark and kissed him until he couldn't breathe, to a night at the end of that week when she'd asked him to her chambers, dragged his shirt off his shoulders and abruptly banished him from her sight, to how she'd grown particularly cold in her treatment of him, though all he'd seen was fear and heartbreak.

This mark has brought her to him and taken her away, the first branding of his life as a thief, the result of his first decision to follow his own morality and not the King's; it made him darker. But he does not care. He does not love her because of it, or because they were _destined_ or whatever Tinkerbell told her. He'd loved the idea that it could help explain why he felt tethered to her, why such strong feelings grew so quickly, but no mark of fate makes anything more or less real for him. Being bound to her has made him feel alive, has bound him stronger to the things within himself that he so wishes to be. He hopes that at least some of their time together did so for her as well.

Robin feels certain of his next words, though he will never _know_ that he's right, "And not that it matters, but the first time we kissed," he continues, turning the wrist with the tattoo up weakly. He swallows past the thickness in his throat, "neither of us knew about this."

"You knew?" she whispers. Her brow knits together as she considers what he's said, and she turns to face him, "But she told me she saw it the day you met here. You didn't—?"

He chuckles at her confusion, a sad sound, "No, no, not in Storybrooke."

Tinkerbell takes a moment to digest. "You know, the other fairies thought I should have left her to be evil, that she was beyond saving," Tinkerbell tells him.

He answers quickly. "I have never known her to be that." He takes a shaky breath, "until now."

She studies him for a moment. "You should not blame yourself."

He laughs again--the sound startles, almost scares her-- throws back another gulp of his atrocious drink.

"Roland doesn't understand," he confesses. He hardly feels his lips moving for the cold. "His Mama died and came back, and he insists that _she_ will as well."

She has nothing to say.

"And Marian?" she means to inquire as to how she's handled the ground opening up beneath her once stable life, but, his mind on Regina, he does not understand her that way.

He swallows; he's clearly agonized over this, not necessarily with the desire to forgive or hate but with the desire to understand. "Regina did not kill her. She gave her own life to ensure she never would." These are the facts, but they are only a small part of what he feels, and he's thought about that, too, "If I was willing to understand that she was not the same person anymore, if I led her to believe that I wanted to be her future, then how cruel was I to abandon her in a second for our pasts?" His voice weakens, an anguished whisper.

Tink surprises him, then, takes one of his hands and squeezes it.

She tenses suddenly. "What was that?" she rushes out.

"What?" He looks around, but she's staring at his hand. "What?" he repeats.

"That," she points. A small tuft of purple smoke wisps out of his palm, then vanishes.

"I don't know."

"Has it happened before?"

"Yes, but only since…I assumed it was from the magic she used to freeze me."

"Must be," Tinkerbell agrees, her brow still knitted together. "Would you like to come inside?" she offers.

"Maybe in a few minutes."

"All right." She stands, reaches down to squeeze his shoulder, and starts to head inside.

"Tink," he stops her when she's a few feet away. "I'm still glad you helped her find me."

She turns back to give him a sad smile. "So am I."

.

.

.

Robin knocks on the door to the room in which Marian and Roland are resting later that night.

She opens the door quietly. "We never really talked," he observes, "after I was injured, and-." She steps into the hallway and closes the door behind her.

"We don't have to, now."

"Marian—"

She swallows, staring down the hallway, anywhere but at him. "You are quite obviously in love with her."

"But she's—"

"Gone? Yes, and I'm very sorry, but Robin—you haven't loved me for a long time. You've moved on. I will not be your choice by default. We both deserve better than that."

"I do love you, Marian," he whispers.

She smiles tearfully at him and lifts a hand to his cheek. "You love me for what I have been to you," she tells him, stroking her thumb once against his stubble, "and for Roland's sake, and nothing more."

"I will always support you," he swears, placing one of his hands over hers. She chokes back the tears; somewhere deep down some part of her had hoped he'd argue, fight for her, tell her she was wrong, but they both know she's not.

"And I, you," she returns.

"Roland is still young, Marian, you have so much of his life still to enjoy. He loves you, and he will grow to be as comfortable with you as he is with me, with time." He takes a breath. "Would you tell Roland about…Regina?" the name costs him; he's been avoiding it, "Not everything, obviously, but I—not for me. I will be—you will know better what he needs to know, and you will be better able to comfort him than me."

She wants to scream at him, how unfair it is for him to ask, wants to yell at him to fight for her, to love her again. "Yes," is all she says, her voice a little flat, "if you'd prefer."

He moves towards her slowly, kisses her temple. "I'm so sorry, Marian. So, so sorry."

Marian runs a hand down his chest, pulls it hesitantly away, cringing. She will have to learn how to relate to him all over again. But she knows in her heart that that has been true since the moment she arrived in Storybrooke. She manages a nod.

"Thank you," he says, his voice thick, and he swallows as he meets her eyes again. "I should go speak to Henry. I promised her that I would—"

"Yes, go," she breathes. She cannot believe she's saying this to him, she loves him, but, like Regina, she thinks—when did they become at all similar?—she loves him enough to let him go. "You should. Goodbye, Robin."

"Goodbye."

They both know it was for more than just the night.

.

.

.

She could not say how, but Marian manages not to cry until he's gone.

.

.

.

When Marian enters the room, Roland hops down from his chair and runs to her, throwing his arms around her legs.

"Why are you crying, Mama?" he asks, throwing his head back so he can see her.

She kneels at his level, taking both of his hands in hers. She will not explain about Robin yet. She's shaking with it herself and she will scare him, and she hates to ruin the calm of his bedtime with the other news, of Regina, but there will never be a good time to tell him.

"Something very sad happened today, Sweetheart." _More than one_ she thinks, she fights not to sound bitter or angry, Roland deserves only her affection and comfort.

Roland puts a hand on her cheek, tears shining in his eyes already. Children pick up emotions before facts, and she knows he can tell something is very wrong.

"Do you remember, when you used to ask your Daddy," she nearly chokes on the word, "you used to ask him what happened to Mama?"

"He said you were gone, but you would always be in here," he explains, putting a hand to his chest.

She nods, kisses his forehead, her sweet little boy, and takes a deep breath, "Regina," she begins. At least the name tastes less like a lie than it once had, "she was protecting me. You, your Papa, the whole town, and she was hurt," Roland sniffles, he knows what's coming, "and she's gone."

"'Gina?" he asks, and she must've seemed invincible to him, adults always do, especially a powerful woman with magic.

Roland begins to cry, sharp sobs that shake his little body as he buries his face in her neck.

She can be kind to his memory of this woman, this mother who gave everything to protect Marian's own family. "She told me to tell you that she loved you very much," Marian lifts her head and pulls him close, begins to rock him, "and that you always made her smile."

She feels a few tears on her own cheeks, and she allows them. Roland will not understand the complexity of her pain, for him and Robin for their loss, for herself for the way she has lost them, for her guilt, and for the guilt she feels that she does not feel more guilty. She feels confident that she has told him all Regina would ever want him to know.

When he's tired himself out, she puts him in bed, and tonight she crawls in beside him. "I love you," she tells him, with a kiss to his hair.

He settles in against her. It has taken them weeks to get to this point, a long time for a child, and really it's felt long to her, but Roland is a loving boy, he gives freely. "I love you, Mama."

He opens his mouth, like he's been waiting to say something, and sure enough he asks a heartbreaking question just as he's about to drift off. "Will she come back, Mama? Like you did?"

Marian swallows, holds him tighter, "No, Sweetheart, she won't." Neither, she knows, will Robin to her, though his true love is gone. He was never going to.

She has her little boy, though, and the chance for them to get to know one another. She has health and safety and freedom, and a seed of hope plants itself in her heart, that in this world, she will be able to find herself, to find balance again. Perhaps even happiness.

.

.

.

Robin knocks hesitantly on the door to Snow and David's apartment. It's David who answers.

He feels guilty for wanting space from Roland, but he cannot handle the guilt of it with the boy who had idolized her and does not understand, useless guilt for not having tried harder to save her. He did everything he could in the moment, and he would not have been able to choose between his son's mother and the woman he… _loves_ , that is the proper word, he will not shy away from it. But he had not done everything he could in the time before. Her death has not chosen his feelings, but the decision he would've made eventually, who he wants to be with for the rest of his life, has become crystal clear, now that he can truly no longer be with her. _Regina. Regina, always._

Henry's in the front room, staring at the wall with Emma's arm around him, looking numb.

Robin sits with him, and he feels he might rightfully be rejected.

Suddenly, Henry grabs onto him, and he finally (for the first time in three days, Emma later tells him) finally cries. Robin cries quietly, keeps his face out of Henry's view, this must be about him, her son. He will do everything he can to help Henry, as he'd promised. Her final wish.

"She loved you very, very much, Henry." He squeezes the boy's shoulders. "More than anything or anyone."

"I know," Henry nods, letting his head fall onto Robin's shoulder, chokes out, "but she didn't love me enough to stay."

_It was herself she did not love_ , Robin thinks, but he says, "It was not about you, Henry, and I will not let you think that for another minute. I promise you it was not because she did not love you as much as a parent could possibly love their child."

Henry nods, fighting the tears, and Robin thinks for a moment how incredibly like her he is, in ways he thinks neither of them could have realized, trying to fight for everyone else and never taking care of themselves.

**.**

**.**

**.**

Snow comes downstairs; she must've just been with the baby, but her face is red and puffy from crying. She does not say anything. She walks up to him and engulfs him in a hug.

**Storybrooke, Present, The Forest**

At first he thinks he imagines them. He cannot see well in the dark as his eyes have adjusted to the brightness of the flames, but sure enough Tinkerbell and Rumpelstiltskin are walking—Tink's _running—_ towards him.

He stands when they reach him. "What is it?"

"We have an idea," Tink tells him, clearly excited, her voice brighter than he's ever heard it.

"I don't want to hear anything from him," Robin barks, refusing to look at the man who had made it his life's mission to ruin Regina's happiness through any means possible, at the man who had taken his infant son's mother from them both and sent her into danger.

"About Regina."

"She's dead," he says angrily, "she's gone, and nothing can help her."

"No," Tinkerbell disagrees, shaking her head.

"What are you saying?" he feels desperation creep into his voice, and a treacherous, powerful vein of hope as he looks between them.

"Oh, no no no, she died," Rumpelstiltskin says.

Robin has just said this himself, but the fury overtakes him and he grabs the man's collar, slams him into a tree.

Tinkerbell grabs his wrist as Robin snarls at Rumple, his fist tight around his jacket. "Robin listen," she urges.

"Why?" Robin grits his teeth, finally glances at her when he feels her hand pulling at his shoulder. "Why are you smiling, Tinkerbell?" he pleads.

"Because we know how to bring her back."

He presses Rumpelstiltskin harder into the tree. "She's gone, I watched her—Henry couldn't save her, it wasn't enough. She must've already been gone."

"That's what I thought, too," Gold explains, "Then I talked to Tinkerbell about some details of the prophecy."

"The what?"

Tinkerbell points at his tattoo. "What exactly did she tell you about that?"

_I could love again._ "That you told her we were destined to be together."

Rumple "Yes, and I was told that you were true loves, but you see, it's much more than that."

"You're soul mates." Tink adds.

"I'm not sure I understand the distinction." He fights the hope because it will crush him when they're wrong.

"When Elsa froze Regina as the portal closed, she froze her heart and body here. Henry's kiss thawed them."

"But she didn't wake…she was already gone."

Rumpelstiltskin continues, "Yes, but her soul was frozen as well, between worlds, not completely gone yet."

Tinkerbell grins, "Snow and Charming are true loves, and they can share a heart while remaining individuals. You and Regina…"

"You think her _soul_ was frozen and then connected to mine?"

"Yes. That's why you have sparks of magic—they're hers."

"Can we—?" he breathes, his head spinning.

"Her magic is within you now."

"But isn't one of the rules of magic—" _you cannot bring back the dead_ , he knows.

"That you cannot bring back the dead?" Rumpelstiltskin asks. "Yes. Emma and Hook were able to defy it because they defied another of magic's rules, that you cannot change the past. But this is different—the portal closed, it will not reopen, but as long as you hold onto Regina, she has not gone. Soul mates have powerful enough magic for that."

.

.

.

When they reach the crypt, he kneels beside Regina, beside the low stone table on which she rests. Her dark hair and black clothes look stark against her pale skin. Robin grasps one of her freezing hands between his and presses it to his cheek. It burns with cold, but he feels a spark of magic where their skin touches. "What do I do?" he asks.

"Remember," Rumple says. "Everything."

"Feel," Tinkerbell amends, "feel everything about the way it is to be with her. Let it fill you up, and the magic will do the rest."

Robin nods as he lets his eyes fall shut and reaches for memories, and as he does he feels sparks on his hands, and power flows to where their skin touches.

_She chuckles, low and genuine, and the sound draws him back after she shoves him weakly away from her. He sweeps her hair in front of one shoulder, lowering his lips once more to the back of her neck, trailing kisses a few inches down her spine, letting his lips skim between her shoulder blades._

_"Robin," she whines, her smile surrounds the word. He grasps the zipper of her black and gray dress, gives her the illusion that he's following orders, but he continues placing warm, gentle kisses to the back of her neck._

_"We have to go," she scolds, turning back to the mirror, her hands at her hair as she tries to comb pieces of it back into place._

_"Mmhm," he hums into her hair, a hand tracing down her spine, "you're rather distracting," and he pushes the fabric to one side so that he has better access, nips at her shoulder._

_She moans as one of her arms comes around his head, her fingers sliding into the hair at the nape of his neck to hold him close._

_Her cell begins to ring, and he picks it up from the table beside them, handing it to her to answer. He's still not comfortable with these odd contraptions, and she giggles at his uncertainty. He gives in, zipping the back of the dress._

_As she says a few words into the phone, he snakes his arms around her waist, and her free hand comes to rest over his on her stomach. He can feel her smile where their cheeks press together._

_…_

_He goes to get Roland, and when Regina answers the door for them he stares at her, drinks in the sight of her, open and happy, warmth in her eyes as she smiles at him. She looks soft in the best way. He kisses her on her porch, passionate but brief with his son standing beside them, and then Roland leans against her and she breaks away from Robin to pick him up, balancing him at her hip._

_"Your Papa and I were thinking we could get you some ice cream on our way to the party," she tells the boy, and he lights up, "how does that sound?" Roland nods vigorously. "Okay," she laughs, setting him back down and offering him her hand._

As the memory fades, Robin feels the ice push back against him, and he wills the magic back towards Regina, through her hand that rests against his cheek. He remembers that fire in her eyes and the way it felt to hold her, her laugh. Fingers of cold reach for her; he forces them back, encourages the light magic to cover the cold, and he feels a wave of warmth run through both of them, weak but definitely there. He grasps at another memory, the first that comes to mind.

…

_They're arguing, the fun kind of arguing, witty and sharp, He sees through it all, of course—she's trying so hard to push him, and everyone, away. He thinks, as he sees real joy, real pain flash into her eyes beneath the playful, then cold exterior, that she has yet to accept that he's as stubborn as she is._

_"Why are you so damn persistent?" she finally demands, and he would shake her if he thought it would help her understand as she continues, "I'm horrid."_

_He can resist no longer, rests his thumb under her chin, sweeps a finger around her lips, across her cheek. "No, you're really quite stunning." He knows he's won when she does not slap his hand away, but suddenly she's dragging him around a corner by his shirtsleeve, though nobody's around, crashing her mouth onto his and pinning him to the wall. Rough, her teeth bite his lower lip, her tongue pushes against his lips until he opens them wider, she presses into him and grips his biceps tight with both hands._

_His hands clutch at her hips to bring her closer, but the corset there leaves nothing of her for him to touch, and so he sinks his hands into her hair instead, pins and ties that hold it slip away until dark strands begin to fall onto her shoulders. He's imagined this, he thinks as he tilts his head and tugs her closer with the hands in her hair. The passion is what he'd thought, it has him breathless and wanting, her legs lined against his and her breasts pressing against his chest, but he also wants to savor the feeling of it, to remember every hitch in her breath, to remember the way her skin feels beneath his fingertips. He slides his hand down, across her jaw, rests his palm at her collarbone and lets his fingers splay up against her neck, a soft touch, barely there, and he endeavors to slow the kiss. He slows the movements of his lips and tongue, takes a breath against her mouth. They're still pressed tightly together, his back against the stone wall, and he feels her grow frustrated. Their lips smack when she pulls away, both of them panting, and then her mouth's at his neck. Her teeth scrape against his skin. She presses warm, open-mouthed kisses there, brings a hand to his neck to tilt his head back, and he relents, allowing his eyes to fall shut. She sucks at his pulse point, and he's gasping._

_A door closes far down the hallway, the sound distant._

_Their eyes fly open. He reaches to catch her hand, but she's too fast, she's gone._

Robin almost feels his frustration from that moment bleed into this one, and for a moment her hand burns against his face. He pushes the feeling away, concentrating instead on the awe of the moment and the desire he'd felt for her, and the burn lessens to a gentle glow, her hand grows cold again, he reaches for more.

_He holds onto her as long as he can, lets his fingers drag against her skin until she's gone through the unnaturally green door. No I'm not all right, she'd said, and he's just beginning to understand how much is there, just beneath the surface, in her dark eyes and shaky smile, in the eager way she presses herself against him for more kisses as her fingers flex into his arm, and he wonders if he has felt more worthy, more hopeful than when he teased out that smile, put light into those eyes, and despite Zelena's threat, a life in which he has found this woman must be worth living._

…

_The night she heals him, he stands at the end of the same hallway and watches as she stares into the dark night. She is good now, he thinks, he has known that from the moment they met, she has made herself good with others' support (some his, he thinks, some his, and despite everything he is proud of that, that he helped her find the things she still loves about herself within her) just as she and others once made her evil. He has wondered if it is poison to love her, but he will not call what he feels for her poison, anymore than he will call her Evil. It is good, their love, it made both of them better. But he has destroyed much, not her goodness, not her, but her joy, and her faith._

He feels angry at himself, now, and again her hand burns with the magic. This time, though, the burning spreads down her arm, and when he opens his eyes for a moment he sees the magic, white and purple veins mixed together, travel down her arm and towards her heart. Tink has told him to feel everything about her, and he holds onto the mixed feelings of that memory, his pain at her sadness, his horror at her past actions, the warmth in his chest from seeing her, the urge to reach and comfort her, his anger at their broken relationship. The magic reaches from her arm to her shoulder and neck. He does not need happy memories, he realizes, he also needs pain, needs love and hatred, sadness, anger, bittersweet loss and joyous reunion, all of it.

_When he sees her for the first time, she's on the ground with a hand around Snow White's arm, covered in black leather. He's heard stories, but this is a complicated woman before him. Heartbreak, that's what he sees. A desperately sad and heartbroken mother._

…

_He goes to find her, he has to, he could not explain exactly why or what he wants to say, he only knows that he needs her. It is selfish, so selfish, but he's hurt and he tells himself he does not care. It is when she begins to run away that he snaps, when she starts to slip back behind that cold exterior and run away. "You will always be that. The Evil Queen," he cries, and he regrets it the moment it's out of his mouth, had begun to regret it the moment the untruthful, poisonous thought sprang into his mind. He sees the sob caught in her throat, the betrayal buried in her eyes, not nearly as well hidden as she probably thinks, and he has just destroyed the beautiful trust she'd given him. He has taken the fragile glass of her trust and hope in him and crushed it, stomped on it as thought it meant nothing, he has burned through their soft smiles and passionate touches and tender kisses, he has burned through them, and as she runs and his legs collapse beneath him, his eyes well up with tears, he had never, ever used her vulnerability with him against her. Now he has, and he thinks he has never been so cruel._

_…_

_She falls asleep in his arms, still trembling from her nightmare, and he crushes her to him, tortured by guilt. He went to find her that day outside her office, and he had no right to find her just to hurt her. He thinks telling her she would always be the Evil Queen started these horrific dreams, she had dreamed he would kill her, just punishment, he could never, he could never, and in a strange way he hopes that what he said set these nightmares off because he'd hate himself even more to think she's been having them all along. She shakes and he wants to kiss her hair again, but he thinks to do so would violate any remnants of trust that allow her to fall asleep in his arms, and he does not, settles for whispering I'm sorry to her once more. He stays awake as long as he can, watches her furrowed brow and tightly shut eyes. But he feels exhaustion, too, her stomach rising and falling beside his own comforts him like nothing has in days, and he slips away as well._

The magic spreads down to her chest now, and this time when the cold intrudes, he burns it back, he feels the flames of anger and hatred, self-hatred, the exhaustion, the comfort, the guilt, and he urges them forward into the ice, feels them scald the frozen water, not just melt it but burn it off. Perhaps this is not a pleasant thing, he thinks, holding onto her soul. It hurts, it takes not just light but also dark and fire and burning. Bringing her back hurts, and fire can wound but it is also warmth and light and everything, and in the darkness it matters more.

_They both take a small sip of wine as they sit beside her fireplace, and it's enough pretense, they need to touch. Their knees already rest together, Regina's legs bent beneath her, but her hand falls into his lap and his closes around her wrist, his other hand gentle on her back. Her shoulders tilt towards him, and he catches her lips as he leans to reach her. She moans, cradles his face with both hands and rubs a thumb against his scruff, smoothes her hands down his chest. Their faces stay close, voices deep, rough, whispering, melted with warmth. The fire flickers, and he plays with her hair, brings her closer, there's no rush. A broken laugh, healing, fingers skim over his tattoo, her heavy smile made light. He's falling for her, and she looks so scared but he doesn't want her to be, they're falling in love, he's held her resilient heart in his hands, he holds her resilient heart in his hands, and he loves her._

_…_

_She pulls away in the Enchanted Forest, pushes and pushes and says hurtful things, and it hurts, but it would hurt more if he could not still see right through it, if he could not tell that it is reflex for her, to do this. She does not let people in, because that has protected her; she let in Henry, and lost him, the same as with many others, and she has vowed never again. He did not understand at the time; she had let him in and then suddenly pushed him away harder than ever before. He had still seen through it, but it hurt, especially because he could see how it was also hurting her. Now he knows that she realized they were soul mates, and that was why she tried to force him away, because even joy makes her sad, she does not think she deserves it._

She does, she does deserve it.

_And when she's feisty and he sends her a smirk he can see how it rattles her, throws her off balance. He becomes as obsessed with drawing that reaction out of her as she seems to be with provoking it._

The magic hits her heart and begins to spread, as though through her veins, down her stomach to her legs and up her neck. The ice still resists, and he reaches for a strong memory, the strongest he can find, he wants it all back, he wants her.

_Once the immediate shock of seeing Marian clears the tiniest bit from his head, his first thought is_ Regina _. He whips around. She's arguing with Emma, her voice stone cold as she pulls on her jacket and gloves, and he feels as though he's been punched, his stomach bottoms out. Beneath her anger tears gather in her eyes, and he watches her pull and pull at them to rein them in, it would destroy her to let herself cry in front of all of these people. He can see it in her eyes, she's certain he's gone forever, and when he calls her name, she cowers, lashes out, he knows out of fear. He steps forward, he has to reassure her—of what, he wonders, that he's been falling for her, does she honestly think it means nothing to him? All he knows is that he has to comfort her, she cannot leave, not yet, this is wrong, he was supposed to be the one person in her life who never made her feel like this._

_He takes another step._

_She vanishes. She has run away, and he cannot blame her. He knows her well enough to understand what he's just done._

…

_Regina does not see him that morning, as she walks down the street with Snow White, bouncing baby Neal in her arms. The skin around her eyes looks dark, her shoulders a little slumped, beautiful but broken, someone who does not know her well would miss it, but Snow sees it too. He knows it's ridiculous, but as he watches Snow put a hand on Regina's shoulder, he feels burning, burning jealousy that it is not his hand, and could not be, that he cannot comfort her himself._

…

_His child loves her, Roland, who will always be Robin's greatest love, and he knows Regina understands this because she has a son, as well. They plot together, giggling and making jokes he does not understand. It is especially beautiful because he knows the pain it must cause her to be with Roland when the little boy she truly needs lives out of reach, without her, but she opens her heart to his little boy anyway, and she makes it look easy._

His own chest burns, cold is easy, fire destructive, but beautiful, and as the power surges through each of her veins, he wills her magic back inside of her. He lets go of the hate-driven dark and love-driven white, the power flows out of him and into her. _I love her, I love her, Regina. I love her_ he thinks, _everything, she is everything, loved and hated, ugly and beautiful, terrible and kind and I love her_ he concentrates on the image of fire burning the last bit of ice that holds her captive. He feels it the moment it happens. Magic no longer flows through him, and his chest is on fire, and then surges with hope and pleasant warmth. The sparks of her magic vanish from his skin and hers.

He opens his eyes, immediately grips fingers around her wrist to feel for a pulse, soon grows impatient. Robin lets her arm fall around his neck, drops his ear against her collarbone as he bends over her upper body, straining to hear a sign of life, vaguely aware of Tinkerbell coming to stand beside him.

Beneath his own, her heart begins to beat.


	11. Chapter 9: Awoken

**_Chapter 9_ **

_Sorry for the wait on this one. It's almost as long as the last one, though, so there's that. :) Please take a moment to review. It means a lot to me._

**Storybrooke, Present**

Her heartbeat sounds weak, faint in his ear, but it's there, it's there, she's alive, and tears fall from his face to her collar, she's alive _she's alive she's alive._ Tink runs forward as Robin lifts his head, both of them holding their breath. Robin takes her hand between his again, slips his fingers between hers and raises the bundle to his cheek, leaning forward. His eyes flit around her face, willing her to wake, to look at him with those deep, dark eyes again, he needs to see her soul back within them to erase the memory of the cold emptiness from three days ago, when he and Henry sobbed over her body— _she's alive_ he repeats to himself, cutting off his panicked line of thought, _not her body, she's not gone, she's alive—_ but he needs to see it all the same.

A moment later her eyes move beneath their lids, and then she's blinking a few times, and opening her eyes, melted chocolate as always, warm and dark and bottomless, he's falling into them, "Robin?" she croaks, her voice hoarse with disuse.

A sob escapes his lips, almost a laugh. "Hey," he breathes as her hand flexes between his.

She does not move, seems unable, and her eyes flicker, fight to close again.

He rubs his hand up and down her forearm a few times. "Stay here," he pleads, reaching for eye contact "come on, keep your eyes open."

"M cold," she hums, her brow knitted together, and a shiver runs up her body to echo her words.

He sets her hand back on her stomach gently, then rips his coat off both arms and tucks the collar around her neck, covering her torso. He glances behind him, and Tinkerbell comes forward, draping her own coat over Regina's legs.

"She's still freezing," Robin notes, his hand shaking a little as he feels her wrist again. The rhythmic pressure of her heart pushing blood through her veins for the first time in three days calms his pounding heart, but he cannot help the clawing worry, her skin seems paler than it ever has, _people do not come back from the dead_. "The hospital?" he asks the fairy, gratified that the coats have quelled the worst of Regina's shivers, though she seems disoriented, unable to react to what would be a horribly confusing situation to her if she were alert.

Rumpelstiltskin steps toward them for the first time since they arrived. "She'll be all right. She just needs warmth."

Robin looks at him for a moment, unsure whether he trusts this man. At least he has the grace and sense to sound vaguely apologetic for his part in the disaster, or perhaps his wife had demanded a promise that he would do his best for them, but either way it's enough for Robin, for today.

"He's right," Tinkerbell nods, watching as Regina's head turns to the side, she's somewhere between conscious and unconscious, "This is magic; this world's medicine will not be able to help her."

Regina's head turns towards his, her hand reaching to grip his arm. "Sleep," she mumbles.

He looks up at Tinkerbell and Gold, and when they nod he brings a hand to her face, yearning to rest a gentle hand on her cheek, to smooth the hair out of her face, but he stops short of the touch, he will not touch her with such tenderness, not now, not yet— _you destroyed her_ , Tinkerbell had said, voicing a truth he'd already known in his heart, he does not feel worthy of it. "Sleep," he agrees, taking a gasping breath as she whimpers and squeezes his arm.

"I'll go call David and Mary Margaret so that they can bring her home," Gold offers, heading up the stairs to the crypt. Rumpelstiltskin may have destroyed her, but he explained how to bring her back, and he can feel somewhere within him, where her soul had taken refuge, the faith that she will be all right.

Robin nods blindly, watching every breath as it leaves Regina's lungs, she's opened her eyes and spoken and her heart beats but he hangs on each breath all the same, _she's alive._

"The stone must be cold," Tinkerbell offers, and if he were to look up he would see the way she studies him thoughtfully, but he does not, "and we have to get her upstairs."

"All right," he agrees. His body, his heart, his soul thrums with the intensity of it, the ache to hold her. He pulls gently at her knees with one hand until her legs reach the edge of the table, slides an arm beneath her legs and another around her waist and lifts her into his arms, standing.

Tink fixes their coats around her, and the last time he'd held her, he'd nearly collapsed. His legs do not tremble now as he leaves behind the stark and empty room for the familiar forest. Her face turns into his chest as he walks them out into the cold night air, her hair catching between her head and his upper arm where he's supporting her neck; his warmth, he tells himself, he's the nearest warm body to her and it's instinct, but warmth fills him at the movement, _she's alive._

_._

_._

_._

Robin sits with her in the backseat of Snow's car, grateful that Tinkerbell and Snow did not argue or even comment when he climbed into the car with her. He lets her head fall onto his shoulder and watches as the streetlights throw patterns of light and shadow against her pallid skin. They have the heat on full blast, so high that he feels hot himself, but relief fills him, she's no longer shivering.

"David and Emma are going to bring Henry to her house," Snow tells him a few minutes into the drive. "We thought it would be better if he saw her somewhere familiar." She then allows the car to sink back into silence, and Robin knows somehow that she did not expect a response.

He has to smile at the thought, her son will see her again.

.

.

.

Robin tries desperately to ignore how Snow and Tinkerbell's eyes burn into his back when he enters the large house with Regina still in his arms and navigates easily and immediately to the bedroom.

Snow flicks the light switch.

He sees Regina more clearly in the stark light, her hair tangled and dry when he is used to it soft and silky, her skin pale except for small splotches of raw red, her black clothes wrinkled, her lips a dull pink.

And she's beautiful, these things make her real, human, blissfully alive, and she will heal.

She stirs but does not open her eyes as he turns towards the bed, her hands fisting into his shirt as though she wants to stay as much as he wants to hold onto her, but the bed will be warmer, she needs comfortable rest, he has brought her here and he knows that once she becomes alert again it will not be this easy, they both need space and time.

The rumpled sheets on her bed shock him at first. He has never known Regina's belongings to be anything but meticulously neat, not even on her worst days in the Enchanted Forest.

The comforter lies in a pile at the foot of the bed, the dark grey top sheet kicked beneath it. But as he finds familiarity in the way the pillows lie, two angled together and the rest thrown aside, as he sees the way the sheet covering the mattress bears the wrinkles of two different bodies, the realization sinks into his chest as a crushing weight. She has not slept in this bed since the day that he was in it with her. She has not even touched it. _The Evil Queen and the Prince of Thieves. Quite the forbidden love story._ The guilt makes his jaw tremble, and anger at her grows in his belly, she does not take care of herself, why does she never take care of herself? (He knows why, he feels helplessly angry at her for it, and at himself.)

Snow lifts the coats off her body, and he realizes that he has halted halfway to her bed, his jaw tight. "Lay her down," Snow instructs. Her uncertainty at his behavior comes through in her quiet tone.

He nods, leaning to place her on the bed, out of his arms, missing the comfort of her weight before he has even stood. His hands hover at her ankles as he thinks of removing her shoes to make her more comfortable. He finds he cannot continue before Snow has unzipped and eased off her black boots. Regina shivers—she has gone for several minutes without the coats, and she is already cold, concern gnaws at his stomach again. He surges forward to place a palm on her forehead, and with relief he notes that the skin feels almost warm enough to be normal, her heartbeat strong and regular when he puts a few fingers on her neck to feel her pulse. Tinkerbell steps forward and helps him to pull the sheet and comforter over her as Snow goes in search of more blankets.

Robin hears feet pounding up the stairs, and Henry rushes in moments later with Snow, David, and Emma at his heels. "Mom!" he cries, running to her. He grabs her hand, and gasps when she squeezes back, a smiling lighting up his face. "Mom," he breathes, a few tears shining in his eyes.

"She'll wake soon," Tinkerbell says confidently as she helps Snow smooth down a few extra blankets.

Robin gives Henry a tight smile, and the next thing he knows, the air has been knocked out of his lungs; Henry has embraced him. "Thank you," her son says, "I knew you could do it." Henry is gone as quickly as he came, glancing between Snow, David, and Emma. "Well, go ahead," he grandmother encourages. He grins and climbs onto the bed beside Regina.

"I want to be right here when she wakes up," he tells them.

"Of course," David agrees.

Henry looks exhausted to Robin, and Robin notices that he's in pajamas—it must be late, past midnight, beyond that he could not even guess.

"We'll wait downstairs," Snow offers, leading her daughter and husband from the room. She looks at Henry, who does not even spare her a glance, sleepy and grinning at his mom.

"You don't have to, your baby is—" Robin begins.

"He's perfectly safe with Granny." Snow gives him a smile, and it's warmer than any of the smiles he's received from her in their acquaintance. "We care about her, too, Robin. We'll be downstairs. Do you need anything arranged for—"

"Roland's with his mother," he assures her, thinking of Marian and the pain in her eyes when they last spoke, it was the right decision for both of them, and they have spoken of how they will allow Roland to spend time with each of them, but the guilt remains for how he has treated her, for how he has treated everyone that he loves, he needs time to process it all.

Snow seems to sense where his mind has gone. "Not tonight," she offers as advice. "Let yourself be here right now. There will be time for everything else."

He glances at her, a bit surprised, and nods.

"All right," she agrees, following her family out of the room.

.

.

.

When Henry finally succumbs to sleep, perhaps his first even mildly peaceful sleep in days, Robin takes one of the many blankets and pulls it over him, but Robin does not sleep, he sits in a chair several feet from the bed and stares and stares. He wants to be there offering her his own warmth, he wants to protect her, to soothe her, but he also wants to hide, not from her, never from her, but from the pain of it all. He thinks again of the tangled sheets when they'd come in, of running soothing hands over her scars, of watching her eyes darken with desire, of holding her gaze with a hand at her jaw and their foreheads pressed together as she came, her face twisting in strained pleasure and softening with release, and the guilt paralyzes him. He loves her.

Any situation which has seemed complicated before in his life could not even approach this, and they tried, they all tried, but he's hurt everyone he loves, that guilt will stay with him for a long time.

He wants—he doesn't know what he wants, he _needs_ her to be well and happy and believe that she should have love and joy, not even from him; he needs her to believe it about herself, that she deserves it.

She is independent and strong, he did not make her good, she did that herself, but surely in order for her to feel as though she has a place in this world, there must be people around her who care for her, and would miss her, and would stay. Guilt rises within him that he has broken her infant faith in that, that a man who fate had assured her would be the one person she could trust has shown in her eyes that even fate desires her to be unhappy. He had only ever wanted to be someone in her life who never made her feel dark or undeserving, and he has failed.

His thoughts turn for a moment to Roland, he must make sure that his son has managed all of these changes, he must help Marian settle as best he can, and make sure she has support and friends.

But not tonight, Snow's words return to him, tonight he will allow the relief to fill him up, she's alive, they have both hurt each other so deeply, but they must find some way to heal, he loves her.

.

.

.

Her eyes blink open just after the sun begins to break over the horizon. Robin sits up straight in his chair, holds his breath, his muscles tense and ready to spring up.

Henry feels the blankets shuffle as she turns her head and stretches her shoulders back, and when her eyes fall on him, he's wide awake for her.

"Henry," she breathes, Gods Robin has needed the sound other voice, soft and rough from disuse but warm, no longer disoriented as it was in her crypt, and he drinks in every detail of it, every tremor, leans further forward in his chair until he barely remains on it. "What happened?" she asks.

Henry lets out a sob then and buries his face in her shoulder, and she's a mother first, always, she focuses on him and ignores her own confusion as she rubs circles into his back.

"You were frozen," Henry chokes out between ragged breaths as her neck grows wet with his tears. "Elsa froze you, but I couldn't—couldn't wake you, and you were d-dead for three days, and I—"

She lifts both arms out of the blankets, ignores how they shake with cold, and pulls him to her more tightly, tears fighting to break free in her own eyes.

Regina does not really understand what has happened, but that can come later. "Shhh," she whispers, pulling the blanket back over them to try and still her trembling arms, brushing the mess of hair off his forehead and pressing a kiss there. "Henry," she says, just the word, every bit of anguish and hope and love wrapped into the low, gravelly tone.

Henry fights to reign himself in at that, though she does not know it; he cannot bear to be causing her any more pain, and he manages to even out his breathing.

Robin stays frozen a few feet away from them, feels like an intruder, prays she will not see him as such.

When Henry has calmed enough to be coherent he tries to explain again, still brief, but a little clearer. "Elsa froze you to protect you from the portal's magic, and we thought that you had—" he cannot bring himself to use the word _died_ again, but she understands well enough, nods that he should continue as she wraps an arm around his shoulders, "but we just had to find the right way to wake you up."

And for some ridiculous reason her ridiculous heart thinks of Robin, and the way he'd wept and cried out the last time she saw him, some vague memory as if in a dream of his face hovering above hers. She pushes those treacherous thoughts away and lets her eyelids flicker shut, warm in her bed with her baby beside her, and no matter how much pain she feels, no matter how many times she's been careless with her own safety or convinced herself some dangerous action was the only choice when she knows it often wasn't, she's happy to be alive. "Did you?" she asks, tipping her head back into the pillows, "did you wake me?"

Robin cannot help himself then. " _I_ did."

Her eyes fly open. Until the sound of his voice, she had not noticed that they were not alone. She pushes her elbows against the mattress to sit up as Henry slides back against the headboard, out of the way of their gazes, looking between them. Regina feels useless, she cannot even hold her own weight, her arms flop helplessly back down.

Robin stands the rest of the way immediately, rushing over and bringing his hands to hover just above her arms, a second from supporting her or helping her sit or just touching her. "Don't push yourself," he admonishes gently, always that lilting concern, melted-warm voice, compassionate eyes.

She melts for barely a second, because he must _love_ her. That's how magical freezing work, it can only be broken with white magic, with love.

Panic sets in then, fear and disgust and self-hatred and guilt and anger, _love isn't enough,_ he'd said that to her. He's been cursed with this love, he has not chosen it, he does not want it, and she has never wanted to force him.

"Leave," she breathes.

"What?" his hands still hover by her the bare skin of her wrists. His stomach would drop if her tone were cold, but he hears the shaking hurt beneath it, and that, he deserves.

"Leave," she repeats, stronger, she feels determination rise within her, "get out," she says with a little more venom. Henry grips her arm beside her and she ignores it for a moment.

Robin looks hurt and unsurprised, he has wanted her to do this, she thinks, to free him from whatever obligation Snow must have placed him under when they realized that only he would be able to break the spell.

But she misreads, she'll later learn, he looks unsurprised because he'd expected her to push him away, because he deserves it, because he's hurt her so severely she could not possibly trust him right now. In that moment he swears to himself that all he wants is to earn her trust back. He does not need to be with her, he does not need to kiss her or make love to her (he does, Gods he does) but more than that he needs her trust, he needs to repair the cracks he's made in the heart he'd sworn to protect, he needs her to love herself at least half as much as he does (as much as he does, he will weep with joy if he has the honor to see that) enough that volunteering to do what she has just done would never again occur to her.

He follows her request, but not before a quick squeeze of her hand, and of Henry's. The boy smiles at him; he has that at least.

Robin sends Snow upstairs on his way out with a promise to return whenever they might need him. She pushes people away to protect herself, but until the day when she sincerely means it, he's not going anywhere.

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.

Regina sends Henry downstairs with Snow, begging a few minutes alone. A reasonable request after returning from the dead, she thinks sardonically.

She takes several slow, deep breaths, gratified that they do not sap her strength as they had in the first moments of her waking. She sits up to prepare herself, then sweeps back the blankets in one swipe, turns, and slides onto her feet. Her knees wobble. She ignores them. By the time she reaches her en-suite bathroom, she stands steadily on her feet. She cups her hands under the water, drinks a few gulps, splashes her face and neck and dries them with the towel. When she has done this, she looks at herself in the mirror, eyes sunken, skin pale, hair a mess—she's still wearing the black slacks and black long-sleeved sweater she'd worn to dinner with the Charmings, she has not been home since then. A shiver ripples through her body, and her muscles weaken. All of this will have to wait. She trips back to bed, shaking with cold by the time she reaches it, and throws all of the blankets back over herself.

She is weak, so weak. But alive, and deep within her, as she has always been, she is glad of it.

.

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.

The sky has darkened when Regina next opens her eyes. She must has drifted off to sleep, she scowls resentfully, walking to her bathroom had worn her out.

Snow comes in about ten minutes later, as if she had a sense for Regina waking. Her step daughter offers a soft smile as she enters.

"Henry's asleep in his room," she says, knowing it would have been Regina's first question. She walks to a dresser, her hands hovering over the knobs, and Regina sits up in bed, tired of feeling weak in front of people. Regina narrows her eyes.

"Where are your pajamas?" Snow inquires, though at least she has enough sense not to start rooting through the drawers without permission.

Regina sighs and looks away.

"You cannot be comfortable in those," she says, shrugging a shoulder towards Regina. "You should change."

"I'll use magic."

Snow's entire body tenses. "You are _not_ using magic just yet. Where are they?"

Regina does not miss the stress the topic has caused Snow, and sits up all the way in bed, the blankets tumbling into her lap.

"Are you afraid I'll hurt someone with it, now that you've assumed it's gone dark again? Is that why you've all been watching me like hawks for the past few weeks?" she snaps.

Snow's lip trembles like the girl she always is somewhere inside of her when she's with Regina, but she presses on. "I haven't been afraid of that in a long, long time."

Regina blinks, and she regrets for a moment the harshness of her answer.

"You cannot use magic because we…do not know if you can."

Regina becomes conscious of how rumpled she must look (Snow has seen her much worse as a girl, but she tries to forget that in moments like these). She runs a hand over her face, threads fingers through her hair and tries to put it to rights. "What?"

"The way you were—the way _Robin_ woke you involved your own magic, and Gold thought it might be better if you waited until you regained your strength before you tried to use it again."

"Well if _he_ thought it was a good idea, then I suppose I should trust him."

Snow's eyes meet hers, her eyebrow raised, the woman is smirking at her.

"Fine," Regina grumbles. "They're in the second drawer down on the left." Snow brings her the warmest clothes she can find without asking, silk pajamas but then wool socks and a heavy sweater and robe.

"Can I bring you something to eat?" she offers.

"I'm fine," Regina replies.

"You need to eat, something at least."

"I'm not an invalid. I'm going to go take a shower, and then I'll come down."

"All right," Snow relents. She leaves Regina to change, and takes the time to go downstairs and make the food before Regina can protest.

When Regina finally comes down the stairs, it has been far too long, almost thirty minutes, and Snow had been on the brink of heading back up the stairs in fear of finding the woman passed out halfway down the stairs.

"Sit," Snow orders, her voice quiet, and Regina turns to see David asleep on one of her chairs with Neal stretched across his chest. _Smart_ , she thinks, Snow knows she won't argue loudly if it would risk upsetting the baby.

Regina sits, sending Snow a scowl that the woman ignores as she brushes damp hair behind her ears. "Eat," she continues, setting a plate of dry toast and a small bowl of broth in front of her. "All of it."

Regina raises an eyebrow, and Snow does so back. She relents, dipping the spoon into the bowl and taking a dainty sip. She would never admit to it, but the warmth soothes her throat.

"You're so stubborn," Snow sighs, shaking her head, "I can see where Henry gets it."

"If you think I'm stubborn just wait 'til your little boy can talk," Regina observes, swallowing a bite of bread, suddenly ravenous.

Snow smiles at her family across the room. "Mmm," she agrees, placing a glass of water at Regina's seat and sitting beside her with one of her own.

"I'm sorry if you feel that I pushed you too hard, Regina," Snow says gently a few moments later, a response to a conversation they had weeks ago at the door a few yards behind them, "all I ever wanted was your happiness."

Regina swallows her bite of bread slowly, scowling at the plate. "Well that worked out about as well as it always has, Snow." She sighs at Snow's hurt expression, and searches for the grace to be kinder and more truthful. "But you were right, about—I was happy, for a little while, I was." Her lips quirk into half a smile for a second at the thought, not even the most tragic of endings could have tarnished those memories.

Snow brushes imaginary crumbs off the table, then meets her eyes evenly. "You will be again."

Regina shakes her head. "I do _not_ want to argue about this again."

"All right," Snow agrees, considering her thoughtfully, it wears on her warm heart to watch someone so surprised when people care.

Regina forces herself to eat slowly, despite her hunger, finishing off the bowl of soup and several slices of bread before she begins to shiver.

Snow follows her to her room, it annoys her to no end, because she has to not pass out, and when she gets there she's too tired to care, she climbs right into bed.

"We weren't afraid of what you'd do to us," Snow tells her sleeping form softly, resting a glass of water at Regina's bedside, and fixing the blankets Regina had not had the energy to move, "we were afraid of what you'd do to yourself." _And we were right_ Snow thinks.

Regina has not quite drifted off yet, and she hears the words, puzzled for a moment before her mind drifts away into sleep.

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.

.

When she wakes, Regina's head feels clouded and dizzy. Her stomach rumbles, though her dinner with Snow could not have been more than twelve hours ago. Her kitchen had not been stocked well the last time she was here. There may not be much to find.

The Charmings _would_ bring her food. _Like she'd ever ask them._ She'll have to make do.

She opens a cabinet, expecting to find a few stale scraps, thinks about some table crackers or anything else she might have had around (it's only been a few days, but it feels like months, since she last ate here), and finds she need not have asked them. Her cabinet teems with more food than she's had around since she and Henry lived alone. She opens the fridge and discovers the same, fruits and vegetables, a tupperware marked "homemade broth" in Snow's slanted cursive, it must be the same Snow fed her…yesterday? whenever that was, several types of juice, and she has to smile, Henry obviously helped. This fridge holds all of her favorites, the brands she usually buys, nectarines rather than peaches, a pile of sweet apples, the cracked wheat bread she prefers. She bends down to see the lower shelf, and a foil-covered dish reads in sharpie _Mom's lasagna. Love, Henry._ A bright green sticky note below adds in her son's neat hand _PS Emma and Mary Margaret helped me make it._ A large yellow sticky-note next to his has Emma's addition _We made three before he was satisfied that it tasted like yours_ and Snow's _David and Hook enjoyed the first two._

Regina laughs. It's ridiculous, but she does, it feels foreign, she has not laughed in so long, but it's absurd, that people exist who care enough to make three pans of lasagna for her just to make sure they'd gotten the recipe right. Henry has grown up watching her make it, but she never knew he cared enough or paid enough attention to replicate it. She laughs again, shaking her head as she cuts a piece and microwaves it for—she glances at the window into a setting sun, she had been wrong, she ate with Snow almost twenty-four hours ago—dinner.

A pile of mail rests on the counter. She sifts through it without much interest or energy as she waits for the food to heat, before a hand-folded piece of paper catches her eye among the rest. She slips her fingers under the tape and opens it to find a drawing of two stick figures, one tall and female, the other short and male. "gEt wEll SooN" it reads, and arrows point at the figures, "mE" towards the little boy, and " GiNa" towards the other. "loVE, ROlaNd". Regina chuckles.

By the time she has eaten, her limbs feel heavy with exhaustion (a wonderful tired, she feels silly, looks down against the card, and Henry baked her lasagna to cheer her up.)

.

.

.

When she wakes the next morning, her head does not pound, it does not feel foggy. She lifts the blankets off of her body, and sighs in relief when she does not shiver or grow cold. She is herself again.

Henry stays with her almost constantly for the next few nights, and his presence is a balm to every wound, the sound of TV comics trails up the stairs, his books lie all over the house, and she has to make extra food for her teenager who's grown so tall. He runs up to her at random moments. hugs tight around her waist, says, "I love you, Mom," and she has to laugh with him.

For a moment, she forgets about deserving, and something like happiness settles over her being, this feels like enough.

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.

"I talked to Robin yesterday," Tink begins on one of her visits.

Regina's hand freezes where she'd been making Henry his dinner.

"He said he needed some time."

Her stomach bottoms out. "I don't want to talk about him," she snaps.

"Okay," Tinkerbell agrees, and Regina has to calm herself down for a moment before she attacks Tinkerbell for her disbelieving tone.

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.

About a week after her return, Regina wakes to the feeling of something soft bouncing against her mattress and the sound of quiet breathing.

She blinks her eyes open, and lifts a hand towards the space above the indent in her mattress.

Her little visitor's head turns, his eyes widening. "Gina!" he cries, catapulting into her arms, knocking the air out of her. "You're awake!"

"Roland?"

He nods into her shoulder, his stuffed monkey smushed between their bodies. She shifts to sit up in the bed; he does not let her go, just clings around her neck as she moves the stuffed animal out of the way and shuffles them awkwardly up so that her back rests against the headboard.

"How long have you been here?"

He shrugs his shoulders against hers. Right, silly question for a five-year-old. A few minutes will have felt like an age. She glances at the digital clock on her nightstand. 8:42.

Roland pulls back a little and gives her a sloppy kiss on the cheek. "I didn't want to wake you," he explains, a frown too serious for someone so young on his face. "Mama said you needed your sleep."

Regina's brow furrows, and she feels momentarily dizzy, from sitting up too fast, from thinking about any member of Roland's family. "Where is your Mama now?" she asks.

"I don't know," he answers, "she said you should call Granny when you wanted her to come get me."

"She brought you?"

Roland nods.

Regina freezes with the shock. Marian is not brazen enough to make herself comfortable in the Evil Queen's living room, but Roland is here alone with her, and she knows as a mother that if Marian did not trust her with his safety, nothing in the world would have kept her from staying.

"Roland," she breathes, not certain of the answer she wants, "is your daddy here?"

Roland shakes his head, reaching a hand out to rest on his stuffed monkey. "Daddy's staying at the camp with all the Merry Men."

She does not have the chance to process that information before a shiver runs up through her spine. The blankets had fallen to her waist when she sat with him, and she hates it, but her body is not quite back to normal yet.

"You're still cold?" Roland notices, pulling ineffectually at the edges of the blankets to bring them to her chin, "but you have so many blankets!" She helps him with the blankets; it's all right with him, to need them.

"Sometimes," she answers, "especially at night."

He stares at her for a moment, wide-eyed, before his hands fist into her shirt.

"Don't ever leave again," he orders, tears gathering suddenly in his brown eyes. "I was so _sad_ and Papa cried and cried after you left and it was scary and—and—and—"

"Shhh," she soothes, lifting her arms out of the blankets to pull him to her, "shh, I'm here, I'm all right. I'm just a little cold, but I'll be fine, I promise"

He sags into her as she uses a thumb to wipe away his tears. The confusion he has known in the past months is more than any child should have to manage, and guilt rushes over her at her part in that.

He does not let her wallow in that for long, as he curls up next to her, his tears dried. "I will keep you warm," he declares, "like Papa and I when it's a cold night in the forest." And it does soothe, the warmth of his skin and his trust in her.

"Won't your Mama and Papa miss you soon, sweetheart?"

He shakes his head. "Not yet," he whispers, as he lifts one of her hands into his and begins to turn it over and back, playing with her fingers in the absent-minded way of a child.

"Gina?" he asks.

"Mhm?" she turns her head on her pillow to look at him.

"You remember bedtime stories in the Enchanted Forest?" he asks.

"Of course I do," she smiles, tapping his nose with her pointer finger.

"Papa never actually left," he whispers, as though telling her a long-guarded secret. "I saw him. He sat and listened outside the door."

"Did he?" she breathes.

"Yeah," Roland giggles, snuggling closer.

Regina takes a breath. "Should I call your Mama now?"

"Can I stay here? Please?" he asks, pushing his chin into her shoulder and stretching an arm across her stomach. "You can tell me a story."

"All right," she agrees, helpless to resist his dimpled smile at her answer. "How about a brand new story? You can go pick one from Henry's room."

He nods enthusiastically, squeezing his arms around her once more before he hops off the bed.

 _What could the child possibly mean?_ she wonders, _Daddy's staying with the Merry Men._ And _he said he needed some time._

She fights down the hateful, treacherous hope.

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.

_A jolt of warmth runs through her spine, then vanishes as fast as it had come._

_She is nowhere, nothing. Cold. Dark. Easy here. No pain, no joy. Empty. The emptiness that she has been searching for since the night she ran from the diner, that she had sought after she lost Henry._

_A wave of heat returns, strong enough to hurt this time, and it returns other kinds of pain to her as well, the pain of grief and hatred and, most of all, of hope._

_For a moment she wishes for nothing but the return of the cold, it beckons to her as it always has, the fear and enticing power that is really weakness._

_Regina knows on instinct from where this fire comes. Something inside of her recognizes it, this force dragging her back to the vulnerability of living. At first she tries to ignore it, to push it back, but, as has always been true of her, and of them, she is helpless to the pull and the feeling that perhaps something real and good may still exist for her in living through this pain._

_She feels the cold around her burn away, leaving her with heat, uncomfortable heat. As the last bit of ice recedes, as her heart beats, she feels. Everything—pain, grief, happiness, love, relief, fear, hope, despair, all of it._

_She comes back into her body, in a cold room on a hard surface. The warmth falls away, and she feels cold, so cold. It returns at her wrist with calloused hands, warm and burning, to her chest where some weight presses against her. She fights to get through the cold to that warmth._

_"Robin?" she breathes, blue eyes the only thing clear to her cloudy vision._

_The warmth comes around her hand again, and she reaches up, up to hold onto it, grasp it, she is so cold._

_Fabric piles on top of her, but the hand has gone, and with it much of the heat._

_The warmth surrounds her suddenly once more, burning all around her, her legs and back and side, and she reaches for it as much as she can, turns her face towards it, her personal sun, though not so unfailingly optimistic as sunlight, real, present, as she turns into it, more fire than sun, a place within the cold and dark that hurts and soothes all at once._

_When the warmth leaves, she panics, reaches for it and holds on, squeezes that hand that had warmed her wrist, feels it squeeze back and linger before it pulls away._

.

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Robin knocks on her door at dawn. It has been a week since she woke, ten days since she died.

She has already dressed, grey today (not black, she needs a break from black, but not _that_ grey dress either, she burned it weeks ago). Henry sleeps upstairs. It is Saturday; he will sleep for several hours more.

"Hello," she says, fighting to keep her voice flat. The second syllable falters when she looks into his eyes.

"May I come in?"

Her heart beings to pound. "Why?" she asks, the word slips out as a whisper, before she can temper out genuine curiosity.

He gives her a soft smile. "Because I wish to speak to you. I think you owe that to both of us."

 _Why do you bother doing that with me?_ he'd said, and he had been right, she cannot hide from him. She opens the door wider for him before she can stop herself, and leads them to her kitchen. A room safe from memories, or at least as safe as anything in her life can be.

Robin picks up the card that's still open on her counter with a grin.

"Tea?" she offers, walking to the sink to fill the kettle, anything to keep her occupied.

"Sure," he breathes, and she turns back to see him smiling at the drawing.

"Roland was here a few days ago," she tells him, she doesn't know why she's letting this happen, making small talk with Robin Hood in her kitchen, she should have pushed him right out the door.

"Mm," he hums, biting his lip, but when he grins at her it doesn't quite reach his eyes.

She looks away from him and tries to ignore the gaze she can feel burning into her back as she waits for the water to boil.

When she sets his mug in front of him, he catches her hand for the briefest of moments. "Sit," he says, shrugging his shoulder towards the stool beside him.

"I'm fine standing," she returns, wetting her lips and attempting to look into his eyes with only mild interest. "Now, say what you wish to."

His Adam's apple bobs with his swallow. The most essential thing first. "I love you."

Her hand twitches against her mug. She shakes her head. "You merely pity me."

" _No,"_ he answers, his voice cracking. He reaches for her hand, and she does not let him, looks down so that he cannot see her eyes.

" _Yes_ ," she returns, it could not be true, she will not allow her heart to believe it, not ever again, "I was dead, and you pity me."

He takes her hand firmly, ignoring her protests. "Do you really think so little of me, and of my feelings for you?"

She narrows her eyes at him, hates that tears gather in them. "You only care I died," she insists, shaking her head.

"You were gone for three days, Regina, and it was _agony—"_

"I know the feeling. You've been gone for months now," she snaps, interrupting him. "You are so selfish! You want me to be here, miserable for you, while you share your bed with your wife at home."

 _"_ Damn it, Regina _, listen to me._ Marian and I have not been right since she came back, we've changed, _I've_ changed, we do not share a bed. We have been over for a long time, long before I met you. Regina, I love _you_ , and your… _death,"_ he chokes on the word, and she looks into his eyes at that, sees the agony that filled them, swallows down an astonishingly strong wave of guilt, "only made it clear to me more quickly than I was managing on my own. For that, I am sorry, but I would have been begging at your doorstep soon anyway."

"I don't want pity or begging," she says, but wonder seeps into her voice at his earnestness, she cannot sound biting.

"You have never had my pity," he sighs, squeezing her hand, "but I will beg for forgiveness for how I have hurt you and you cannot stop me."

In her weaker moments, she has dreamed of him coming and saying he loved her, but it cannot be true, she refuses to believe it, it will hurt so much more when is crashes to the ground again, she knows that from experience. "You were fooling yourself, with whatever you thought you saw in me."

He shakes his head vehemently. "No, I wasn't."

Her eyes flit across his face. "What, saving your wife? And what kind of life do you think that would that have been, knowing that I'd let her die?"

"There must have been some other way," he pleads.

"None as just," she says flatly.

"Regina what you did, saving Marian…I am grateful, but please, please do not think it would have been just, if it had killed you."

"Wouldn't it have been?" She glares at the sincerity in his gaze. "You'll find out I killed someone else," she bites out, pushing, always pushing, "A friend, a cousin." She takes a shaky breath. "And we'll go through this all over again."

"No," he swears.

She stares into his determined eyes, "How can you be so certain?"

"I have held your heart, and you try so hard, you feel so deeply—that is all I have ever needed to know to love you."

She gasps as his words echo in her head, noisy and impossible, but she is not meant for this, for someone so good, she is too dark, she has always been too dark. She slips her hands from between his. "Go back to your wife, Robin," she sighs.

" _Regina."_

"No," she shakes her head, backing a few steps away. "That is the choice you made, because it is the right one. You made it the moment you saw her and walked away from me."

He's grasping at straws. "What if it had been Daniel who appeared out of nowhere? What would you have done?"

She chokes on a sob, _he does not know that it had been, once, that she had to kill him, let him go again, her fault, again._ "It wasn't the same, you know it wasn't." Tears begin to slip down her cheeks. She meets his eyes. "I was so much easier to love when he loved me. Now leave, _please,"_ she begs.

He swallows, glancing down at the table. His blue eyes burn with determination, but when they meet the pain in hers, guilt and pain filters through, Regina does not understand.

He stands to leave, _I deserve that,_ he thinks, and for a moment she feels abandoned, lost, he knows her better than to give up so easily. Her thoughts distract her from noticing before he has raised her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss there. "You have time, Regina, as much time as you need, but I'm not giving up."

A shiver runs up her spine.

He threads a few fingers through her hair, pushing it behind her shoulder with a tender smile, and as he slips quietly away, her treacherous heart pounds.

 _Dark, I am too dark,_ she reminds herself, attempting to even out her breathing. Her heart pounds anyway.


	12. Chapter 10: Stunning

**_Chapter 10_ **

**Storybrooke, Present**

Belle paces through the shelves of Storybrooke's library with a book in her hands, paging through it carefully. Occasionally her eyes catch something of interest and her finger hovers over a few words before she shakes her head and moves on, begins to pace again.

"A—" she mutters to herself, lifting the next heavy tome into her arms from her pile at her desk, "aegis, air— _amulet_ " and at last the photograph in this book looks like Zelena's necklace, perhaps she will finally have her answers.

Curiosity drives her, always curious for knowledge. Well, that, and she has to admit that perhaps she's doing this just a little for Regina. Belle has hated the woman for decades with such passion, but somehow watching her these past few weeks has made her understand things about her husband that she never has before, reminds her of his vows never to forget the distance between who he was and who he is, and perhaps she can find answers; perhaps it will grant a reformed villain a scrap of peace. Regina tortured her and took her from Rumpel, but then Rumpel had spent years turning her into the kind of person who would, and tried to retaliate by taking Regina's love from her (not successfully, she suspects, she's seen the way Robin looks at the now-resurrected queen) but this cycle has to end somewhere. It's ending with her.

She reads a paragraph in the entry for a second time as she grabs her purse off the desk with one hand and retrieves her cell phone. Rumpel picks up on the first ring.

"Belle? Is something wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong. Would you-would you mind stopping by the library when you get a chance? There's something I'd like to show you."

He's there in ten minutes, always seems to worry something's gone horribly wrong (who could blame him, or anyone in this town?).

She has the book open for him when he arrives, and she's read the entry twice through, reads it for a third as he does. "You've been researching this?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

She shrugs, "I was curious. And I think we owe Regina the chance to know the truth."

He looks uncomfortable. "Well, I don't know about that."

"Rumpel? Don't you see, this is only part of the answer—there's no way she could've had power for even the most basic of magic. The book says that once her amulet was taken, her magic would have been broken completely, not just from her, but her magic wouldn't even _exist_ anymore."

He stands over the book and searches the entry, though his eyes wander, do not settle on the words. "Are you certain?"

"Absolutely. I've read every entry on the subject that we have."

"But perhaps…" he trails off.

"Rumpel, what's going on? There's absolutely no way she could have killed herself; you can see that right here."

"Belle, I—" he begs, reaching for her.

She backs out of his grasp. "You know how she died; I can tell you know."

He stays silent.

"Doesn't it mean anything to you, being honest with me?"

"She didn't," he finally admits, his face hardening.

She touches his arm and turns him to face her again. "What?"

"She didn't, Belle. She didn't kill herself."

"Then—" it's occurred to her immediately, but she pushes it away, doesn't want it to be true, "No," she gasps, growing angry.

He looks down. "What?"

"No, you will tell me the truth, Rumpel!"

"I—"

"You? You hurt her? How could you?" she cries, "You lied to me? To all of us?"

"Belle," he starts.

She will not let him, interrupts his words, "And you married me thinking…what? That you would hide it from me forever, or that I wouldn't care when I found out?"

He tries to catch the hands that she's moving around furiously as she speaks, "She killed Bae, Belle. She killed my son."

She scoffs, shakes her head. "Get out," she says flatly.

"Belle, please," he catches her hand.

"Get out. Get out and stay away from me."

Once the door falls shut behind him, Belle sinks back against the wall, buries her face in her hands, catches the glint of a wedding ring as it scrapes past her cheek, moistened with tears.

.

.

.

Regina enters Granny's the next morning and nearly knocks herself and Belle over as they cross paths near the counter.

"Watch where you're going!" Regina demands, straightening her coat.

"Sorry," Belle mumbles, looking horrified and confused and not at all her confident self.

Regina sighs, "I shouldn't have snapped at you."

Belle shakes her head, still looking down, so unlike her.

Regina is about to walk around Belle and get on with her day when the woman finally meets her eyes. "I've been looking into Zelena's death," Belle confesses.

"You what," Regina says flatly, hardly a question, it is one thing that this town knows how miserable she is, but why do they all have to be so _interested_ in her private life, as if any of them give a damn?

"I thought you might like to know why—"

"—my sister killed herself. And so you took it on as your little project."

"Regina, I never meant to pry, I just—I thought I would figure out how the magic worked, and then I found out that without the amulet, she never would've had enough power to turn herself into porcelain, and—" Belle looks properly angry now, and then the anger sinks away into a mess of horror and affection and betrayal. Regina turns around to see Rumpel walking through the door.

Regina glances between them, anger bubbling in her chest, watches Rumpel almost cower at the look on his wife's face. "You killed her," she growls at Rumpelstiltskin, an accusation more than a question, she's always suspected, and the pieces finally fit.

He does not respond. Her struck expression lasts for barely a few seconds before it darkens into fury. Her heels clack loudly as she moves until her face is inches from Rumpelstiltskin's.

"She killed my son; you would've done the same," Rumpel argues, his features curling into a snarl.

Purple magic flares from Regina's hands and winds around his neck. (Damn him; he is right.) She tightens the chokehold.

Her hands ball into fists, "You killed my last blood relative and sent Emma and the Handless Wonder back to the future. As if it weren't enough that you tried to trick me into hurting Robin," she all but spits into his face, "and that you threw Marian into my path for me to kill."

"Regina, please," Belle begs, wincing at Rumpel's face and stepping forward.

" _Regina_ ," another voice adds, and a hand cups her elbow, she had not even noticed him sitting with a few of his men in a corner booth, but only one man would dare touch her while she has somebody else in a chokehold. She throws Robin a glare, watches his hands fly to his neck and try to tug at some invisible rope. She stumbles back, her eyes wide, relaxing her hands and her magic; she'd been choking him as well.

He lunges for her. Regina vanishes in a cloud of purple.

_I love you_ he'd said, but she is impulsive, violent, dangerous, she has just proven it. She slams the door to her house shut, the wood trembling, her legs faltering as she kicks off her heels, _he could not possibly._ In any case, he shouldn't, and perhaps this will finally force him to see why.

**The Enchanted Forest, Ten Months Into the Missing Year**

"Regina, wait!" Robin follows her out of the meeting almost at a jog, his hands outstretched.

Regina keeps up her pace until his hand makes contact with her upper arm, not even gripping yet, just hovering there, and she whips around.

"You are _not_ tracking down that lead by yourself." He touches her fully, meets nothing but the thick fabric of her cape.

"Watch me." Her eyes dance at the challenge as she throws her arm to the side to dislodge his.

He drops his hand away, but takes a step closer. "I don't think I will, Milady."

"Your Majesty," she corrects, attempting to meet his eyes evenly, faltering at his closeness.

"Regina," he returns, exasperated. Everyone around her fears holding eye contact, it is a given, she has come to expect turned heads and averted eyes, and yet here is the Prince of Thieves, actively searching for it.

"Once again, I did not _ask_ for help."

He raises an eyebrow. "And, once again, it looks like you're getting it anyway."

Regina does not back down, meets his gaze evenly. "What are you offering? Your services as…a _thief?_ " The word does not sound like an accusation from her lips; it rolls off with the mocking warmth of a nickname, teasing.

"Mm," he hums, "seemed to work for you the last time."

Regina scoffs. "As I recall it, you spent the lion's share of the evening immobilized near the entrance door."

"And as _I_ recall it, that was your fault, not mine, and you gave me a set of gold-tipped arrows for my trouble."

"That wasn't for your efforts once inside the castle." Banter, she had wanted, she had meant to throw teasing words back at him, and has stumbled on a private truth. Snow had teased her mercilessly for that gift, _admit it, you like him_ she'd said with her easy smile, her knowing grin as Regina groused _I will admit no such thing_. "They were not for your work as a thief," she amends. (Though hasn't she already told him this…?)

"Oh? By all means, enlighten me." There's that smirk again. His eyes flicker down, and it is then that she notices the hand she has rested against his chest. The air grows thick with her unsaid thanks and burns with the warmth of her hand against him, separated only by a leather vest and flimsy cotton. His heart thuds beneath her hand.

The gift for the honorable thief who had risked his life to help her, who had dared to aim an arrow at her head when she began to use magic, who had tried to stop her from putting herself under the sleeping curse, who also carries guilt for the part he had in the death of the love of his life, whose face lit up at the idea that she had opened her eyes and found some reason to live, who had instantly known she was a mother, who saw the best in her, the love of which she is capable, when all others ever seem to see is the worst, the hate. The silence becomes deafening, and why is that hand still on his chest? She should really move that. Has she answered him yet, the terrible thief?

She scrunches one eye half closed, almost a wink, scrambles for banter again. "In any case, you make a poor thief, giving away everything you steal to others."

(He lets her get away without an answer, but his does not help at all.) "And you make a rather terrible Evil Queen. Giving gold to an outlaw and insisting upon saving the entire land on your own?"

She glares, but even she can tell it does not come off as angry, shivers at the way he's staring at her, at the unmistakeable earnestness of his words. Why? Why has he said them, and why has she been drawn to this man since the moment they met? The air trembles between them now; they are close, so close.

"Sorry to disappoint," she manages, the words growing breathy at the end.

"On the contrary," he smiles at her, no trace of that smugness or that smirk, all honesty, "I'm quite taken with you, and I would rather you not get yourself injured."

She takes a ragged breath, the playfulness of her features melting into pained confusion. "Why are you so damn persistent? I'm horrid."

His closes the few feet that remain between them, his thumb lifting her chin, his pointer finger tracing around the side of her lips and across her cheek as he holds her eyes. So gentle with the face of an Evil Queen; she does not understand. "No, you're really quite stunning."

She shivers, meets those blue eyes, and then she has a fistful of his sleeve, has thrown him around a corner and against the stone wall. Regina's lips crash into his, sloppy at first, the angle wrong, their noses bumping.

And then he's tilting his head and groaning into her mouth and it's suddenly right. Dizziness swirls through her head, the heady scent of pine and damp and fire smoke clings to him as he breathes against her, his hands finally moving, grabbing at her hips until their legs press together, and she notices the difference in their height so close to him; she has to tilt back her head to reach his lips even in heels. She jolts, does not mind it, feeling small; it makes her feel human, even in the monster's clothes, she feels like Regina, and Regina wants him, it almost scares her how much.

_God,_ kissing has not felt like this since—it has—screw analyzing whatever this is, she's wanted it for months, and she presses into him farther, tugs his bottom lip between her teeth, runs her tongue against his lips, curls her hands tighter into his arms as his tongue swipes against hers, banishes thought.

Regina feels vague warmth where his hands grasp her hips, but nothing more, the ribbing in her corset prevents it, and she suddenly misses her silk blouses and lace bras; she would feel every callous on his archer's hands through that, the thought makes her shiver. Her breasts and stomach and thighs press into him, and she almost growls, wants more, wishes she had given into temptation last week and done this when he walked with her back to her chambers after an overnight emergency, when she'd been wearing tied silk robes and nothing more.

She nearly whines into his mouth when his hands leave her hips. Whatever this is needs out of her system, and she needs him to cooperate and not be a gentleman or whatever it is he thinks he's doing. The Queen and the Thief in her castle corridor, whatever rules of propriety he has in mind, none matter.

His hands tease into her hair, she had misread, he's not going anywhere, and the band around the ponytail loosens, the weight of her hair sinking lower on her scalp. Pins clatter to the stone ground, strands falling out and over her face as his fingers dig into her scalp and guide her head to tilt farther back. His gasps go straight between her thighs, make warmth bloom and shimmer there and in her belly. That night when she read to Roland and she left her hair down she'd caught how his eyes lingered on the curls running down her back; she's not blind to the effect she has on him, and she considers yanking it down so that dark curls might drape down her shoulders and ghost over his arms, but that would require moving her hands and she likes them much better as they are, wedged between the hollow of his neck and the stone wall.

Without warning, Robin's kisses slow, become soft. He pants, takes a deep inhale against her lips, and his eager, breathless, shuddering contact with every part of her body gentles. Now she _is_ whining, he has splayed fingers up from her collar towards her neck, to push her away, she wonders, his hips fall back against the wall where they had been grinding into hers. He does not stop kissing her, though, if anything this feels like something _more,_ the tenderness of it, and she cannot have him thinking about what's happening so she lowers her mouth to his neck, her upper lip catching and dragging between his. She flicks her tongue at his skin, scrapes teeth against his neck and the hollow where it meets his shoulder. His breath ghosts across her cheek in pants, and she smirks into his skin; she has him quite incapable of pulling away and thinking this through. She holds his jaw with one hand and tilts his head on his neck so that she can reach more of his glorious skin. (She has not been so turned on by drawing gasps and moans out of someone else in decades, but she does not stop to think of that. She has felt powerful before, forcing men to their knees with her body, but never with a man who dared to call her Regina, it has never made her feel so beautiful and wanted, powerful in new ways.) Her lips find his pulse point, and she savors his gasp as his fingers dig into her waist, wants to make him gasp a hundred times more.

A door slams several hundred feet down the hallway, distant as in a dream.

Her eyes fly open, panic surfacing through darkened irises as she yanks back, meets his gaze, sees desire glimmer before he processes her expression and the need fades into concern.

She drops her hands away from him, and runs.

She is beautiful, she knows that, a temptress, but whatever he thinks he's getting himself into...he has no idea, and she will leave before he realizes he could not possibly want her, before something forces him to find out.

.

.

.

She avoids him entirely for two days, pretends not to be in her room when Roland comes searching for a friend, and the dejected frown of the boy's dimples almost breaks her, but she stays resolute. Interacting with his son might lead to a conversation with his father, and in any case Roland has inherited the dimpled smirk she's not prepared to look at in any form.

Of course, she cannot avoid the unCharmings' little planning meetings. Regina waits for the final member of their party while determinedly looking away from him, and she feels like Henry as a toddler sticking fingers in his ears and crying out nonsense syllables when he didn't want to hear her soothing words during a tantrum.

Snow begins the meeting, of course, by bringing up their past. Regina cannot stop herself from sassing _I'm helping_ but this is good, she thinks, reminding Robin of all the reasons why he should stay away, no matter how enticing he may find her hair and her cleavage.

But damn that man, Snow has just reminded them all how Regina tried to kill her and take away her baby, and he's _smirking_ at her; she cannot help but remember how those lips felt on hers. Those dimples and his smugness at Snow's insistence on his coming, those laughing blue eyes—it's so _attractive_ that someone has the gall to smirk at her.

_Henry_ she thinks, she's always thinking of him, growing attached to people in the past has never served her or them well, and she's scowling, the Evil Queen would say at his presumption, but Regina has learned from experience, this _thing,_ whatever it is, will lead to pain. Best to stop it before it even starts.

.

.

.

He follows her out of the meeting. "Are you all right?"

She sighs. "If you're looking for a distraction like the other day, go find somebody else, Outlaw. I'm busy keeping everyone from getting killed."

"You'd be helping a lot more if you didn't snap at me when I tried to help, too."

She groans, and it sounds weak, tired, even to her own ears. "Would you leave me the hell alone?"

Robin bites his lip and nods, his eyebrows infuriatingly higher than usual. "Absolutely, if that's what you really want."

She prides herself on faltering for only two seconds, steps closer, never one to back down. "It is."

"Mhm," he hums, and his eyes glimmer at this distance, it reminds her of a brook that ran across the grounds of her childhood castle, mesmerizing, and before she has noticed the movement she's leaned so close that his breath ghosts over her lips, and she shudders, leans closer. He bridges the last few inches between them (perhaps she does, but she will always blame him for it, their second kiss, those damned eyes and the way he wouldn't let her push him out of her life) and Robin kisses her again. She had promised herself to get this out of her system and move on, but she was wrong, it's just as good as it was three days ago, better, perhaps, she cannot stay away from the intoxicating pull of his fingers on her waist and the taste of him on her lips and the way he groans freely when she presses their bodies together. She'll have to kiss him sometime out of her corset and see how he reacts then (and she tries to fight that thought, fails, she'll kiss him again, she is too weak to stay away.)

**Storybrooke, Present**

He finds her on the fallen log a mile past his camp in the forest, and she nearly curses. She needs to remember not to come here, because he somehow always manages to track her down. (She'd never admit it, but maybe, just maybe, she's come in the hope that he would.) She shivers, hates how it makes her heart clench that he cares; twisted, such a thought, but Robin wanting her safe is a scrap her soul devours desperately.

"Not a pep talk," he begins with his hands help up in surrender, a tentative grin on his face.

She almost laughs. The last conversation they had here had felt awfully like one.

"I'm sorry about Zelena."

"Thank you," she breathes, glancing quickly away.

"I would've had him in a choke hold as well, if I had magic," he offers.

She laughs, but it is hollow. "No, you wouldn't have, Robin."

He sits beside her cautiously. As though next to a bomb that could explode at any moment, Regina thinks bitterly, and so he should.

"Mm…," he rests his hand on the log beside hers, and the absence, the wanting of touch distracts her more than touch would, "I think you underestimate how much distaste I have for that man."

She frowns at her knees. "I'm sorry that I—"

He shakes his head, so calm, dares to squeeze her shoulder for just a moment, and that has her glancing into his eyes. "It was nothing, Regina."

Her brows knit together; despite how he approached her, he seems so entirely unafraid. "I did exactly what you were trying to stop me from doing."

"I was trying to be there for you. I haven't been, properly, in too long." His jaw hardens, rage boils within him stronger than it has in years, and he tries to calm it, reminds himself why it never works. "I don't give a damn about Rumpelstiltskin; he needed someone to call him out." He pauses, his lips tipping into a sad half-smile, "Anyway, even if you think you don't know it, you would've stopped yourself before you actually hurt anyone."

"I _don't_ know that," she agrees, glancing into sea blue eyes, they hold her, she cannot look away, "and neither do you."

Pain flits through his eyes, settles in the creases of his brow, and she has a glimpse into what she's been trying to ignore, the way it hurts him when she says she does not believe him; a hopeless sap, this man. In another lifetime, she would find it endearing.

She indulges in that for a moment, helped along by the way he covers one of her hands with his own and presses his thumb into her palm in lazy circles. "I never told you," he begins, watching their hands, I don't know why. I should have. But you don't commit your life to robbing from the rich and giving to the poor unless you're trying to make amends for a dark past. " When she does not pull away, he switches the bundle of their hands from her knee to his.

"It's not the same," she insists.

"It's not entirely different," he returns.

"How could you say that, after what happened today? After an accident of fate alone spared your wife from death at my hands?"

"You did not kill her, and you never will, because you are _not_ that person anymore."

She thinks suddenly and inexplicably of Henry's heart rate bottoming out, of the monitor flatlining and that awful beeping sound, of knowing she had nothing in the world to live for, that she had failed as spectacularly as a parent as it is possible to do, even worse than her mother. She thinks of her certainty that she should suffer for eternity for what she had done to her baby, and the choking guilt rises into the present, the grief. She lets out a sob before she can help herself, remembers his haunted eyes by the fire when he told her about losing Marian, and the hurt in them as he yelled _you will always be the Evil Queen_. "But I am!" she cries, hostile again, pushing him away, "You are so foolish, Robin. I am still her. It matters not if one person did not die by my own hands. Hundreds did, and she so easily could have. For that matter, so could you. There are many who have lost what I lost and did not turn into," she coils her shoulders into herself, " _this_. That darkness is what I am. It always has been, and it always will be. I hurt the people I love. It is what I do."

His heart pounds, she has very nearly said she loves him, and he's offering himself to her, why will she not accept his love. "You're not going to make me hate you. _Please_ stop trying. "

"No," she growls, a short, stubborn syllable.

He turns to face her fully. "Gods, Regina, you are so determined to think ill of yourself." Her eyes search his pleadingly, begging him to stop. "Of course you are her in some ways. You share her body, parts of her mind—but choices change us. Yours have, as have mine. You have become someone so much better, and I won't let you ignore that, or throw it away like it doesn't count for anything."

"Don't patronize me, Robin." She faces him on the log, throws her hands to the side as she speaks, her voice loud. "I try, you know that, and every time I do _this—"_ for how could she describe their situation, what words could capture it? " _this_ is what I get."

He has caught one of her hands as she spoke, loosely clasped in his fingers, and she feels her hand move up his arm, her fingers sliding over cotton and skin as they have once before until they rest over the lion crest.

"I was so foolish," she tells him, spoken into the air between them in a small voice, she cannot look at him, looks only at his arm, "I thought this—" she squeezes his wrist "—would mean that you could not hurt me. I thought it made me safe. I was even beginning to believe that I deserved—"

"You do," he interrupts, stretching out a hand to cradle her face.

She turns her head away from him. "Not enough, not enough to—Timing indeed," she scoffs. "How could you be so naive? Timing when I was meant to catch you in a spider's web and cause your destruction? That guilt you felt about your wife; it was because of me, because Rumpel wanted me dark and angry, because I went willingly, because I would have killed her, you know I would have."

He grows angry (at her pain, always at her pain, never at her), he loved all of her enough to bring her back from the dead; why does she not think more of him, and his love for her.

"That is not how this works." He yanks his sleeve down, covers the mark, gathers her hand between his and crushes it over his heart, refusing to let her go. "The tattoo is what you saw when Tinkerbell brought you to meet me long before you were ready, but it has nothing to do with how I fell in love with you. I love you and your damned stubbornness, your soft spot for children, your determination, the depth of your feelings, your resilient heart."

"Stop," Regina gasps, her head spinning.

He shakes his head. "No." His lips quirk, all warmth, "Did you really think your soul mate wouldn't be just as stubborn as you?"

She yanks her hand away. "What do I have to do to explain that I—" And though he's seen her do it once before, in this very spot, in fact, his eyes widen as she reaches into her chest and wrenches out her heart. She gasps at the pain, breathes a little easier when her feelings move slightly farther away from her. It's distancing, like a strong painkiller, it separates her soul from her feelings, but not enough, not enough.

"Regina, what are you—?"

"Making my point." She turns the organ over in her hands, weighing it. "Look at it. Really look at it this time. It should disgust you, the black rotting all over it. It disgusts me." She shoves her heart into his hand, and her arms tremble as it touches his skin.

He shakes his head. "I see the darkness, Regina, but first I see the red fighting to come back." He looks into her eyes then, sees them shining with tears, her shoulders trembling, all while she fights to look strong.

He runs his thumb gently up and down her heart, as he would her hand if she would let him touch her again. She gasps as a mixed wave of grief and euphoria washes over her at the touch. He thinks of her determination as the white magic sped from her hands and disarmed Zelena, of the way she sagged into his arms as he first returned her heart to her chest. "You've always been able to feel when I'm holding it."

"Yes." She holds out her hand for her heart, before she risks saying something too honest and ridiculous and hopeful. Rather than hand it over, he wraps her hand around her heart, beside his, and helps guide it back to her chest,

"That darkness is in everyone, Regina. It's what we choose to do about it that matters."

She takes a shuddering breath as emotion rushes back over her. "I chose wrong." He almost groans; she is so determined to have it both ways, that he has no choice because they are soul mates, and that they have a choice, and she went wrong.

"Not always, Regina. Choose right, now."

She stares, stands and stumbles back from him, words falling from her tongue—is she trying to twist the knife deeper for him? She doesn't know.

"I almost killed Henry," she whispers. "I was trying to keep him from…Emma was…he was leaving me for Emma, and he took the curse I intended for her. His heart stopped. I though I'd killed my son, Robin."

"Regina," he gasps, she thinks it must be in horror at her, and then he's standing and pulling her to him and cradling her head against his collar, tilting his chin against the top of her hair. She's wearing low heels today, and he dwarfs her, strong hands at her back, he sways with her for a moment before she shoves him off angrily.

"You should stay away from me. You, your wife, Roland, Snow, Tinkerbell, stay away from me, all of you. I was never meant to have any of it. I will hurt you."

He steps towards her. "No, you won't."

She uses one arm to send him back to his camp in a purple cloud before he can argue any more.

Regina stares at the empty spot where he'd been moments before, hates that she still wants him to comfort her, that he can do it so well, and then she lifts her arms and poofs herself home.


	13. Chapter 11: Peace

 

**_Chapter 11_ **

 

**The Enchanted Forest, Ten Months Into the Missing Year**

 

“Regina,” he gasps out.

She kisses him, insistently, again, her fingers curling around his shirtsleeves, her body lifting into his.

“Regina,” he repeats against her lips, this time with gentle hands at her hips, holding on but not pulling her in—pushing her away.

She gasps out a whine, an exasperated _Robin_ , pushes back against his hands, but though he stays gentle, his arms do not give way.

She breathes heavily against him, lungs filling and emptying completely. “ _You’re infuriating_ ,” she grumbles. His laughing eyes only make her more irate, the pad of his thumb brushing hair out of her eyes gets her to narrow them, the desire no cooler, but the softness there hardened.

“What does it matter? I’m just a distraction.” Bitterness creeps through, frustration, sharpness in his words.

Her startled eyes meet his. “What?” she asks, of his sour words and his refusal to just _kiss_ her already when they’ve been doing this for three days, each day since that council meeting and their second kiss. Well, not like _this_ , not in her chambers, with both of them in their nightclothes.

This _thief_ should be out of her head by now; after a week of this, that first moment of weakness in the castle hallway, then the second; and—how many times has it been? four? five?, once when they had been searching the grounds for signs of the Wicked Witch and she had yanked him off the trail and behind a tree; again when she’d found herself walking to supper just behind him and she’d found them an empty passageway behind one of Leopold’s opulent tapestries; but never like this, in her chambers, out of their day clothes and in the dark and alone without the risk of interruption. Roland already asleep and most of the others either in bed or headed there.

This _man_ should be out of her head by now, and yet he fills her mind at the oddest moments, precious moments when she should think of Henry, and why, in those precious few moments when she can breathe, when she feels air sufficient for filling her lungs, does she often think of _him._

A scowl knits her brow together, and he seems to catch sight of it, places a hand between them as though to hold her jaw, _damn him_ why has his face twisted with concern, why does he have to look so gorgeous worrying about her.

He weaves fingers into her hair and tugs gently as he speaks. “Why do you insist on breaking into Rumpelstiltskin’s castle on your own?”

“I have magic,” she scoffs.

He eases away from her, just a few inches, searching her eyes. “Even with magic you are not invulnerable.”

“I’m damn well close,” she says flippantly, rolling her eyes.

He catches her chin with the back of his hand, lifting it so that she might look at him, “I really don’t think you are.”

She barks out a dark laugh. “Happily for you, that’s not your concern.”

He arches an eyebrow. “What if it concerns me anyway?”

“I don’t believe anyone’s asked you to care.”

“Regina.”

“No—outlaw, you do _not_ get to tell me what to do.”

“Even when you’re putting yourself in needless danger?”

“Who better? I don’t have a son who would miss me if I were gone!” she gasps at the words that have fallen from her lips, the tears springing into her eyes easily, rapidly.

“Regina,” he sighs—he’s always saying her name like that, with that lilting concern that makes her feel weak and strong all at once—and he’s brushing her tears away with the pad of his thumb, “your son would not wish you to be so careless with your safety.”

She watches his Adam’s apple bob with his swallow, feels energy drain out of her eyes, leaving them open and vulnerable, hatefully so, the submerged pain now floating on the surface, easily visible.

Her fists clench. “ _Henry_ does not know who I _am._ ”

“That doesn’t mean you’re not still his mother.” He says it kindly. If anything the agony in her eyes spreads. “I’m sorry—I didn’t bring it up to—“ he sighs, meets her eyes as she takes half a step away from him, “ _I_ do not want you to be so careless with your safety.”

She stares, unable to find her legs and run, and no one but Snow has said that to her in so many words in decades.

“Why the hell should you care? It’s not your fault that I lost him,” she says harshly, backing away from him once more.

“That doesn’t mean I don’t care.” He reaches a tentative, hesitant hand out to cradle her neck.

“Why did you come here tonight?” It would have been so easy for him to expose her vulnerability to the others, to say what he saw that night when they broke in to her castle, so easy to see her as deranged and hopeless, beyond help. Why hasn’t he? Why didn’t he, that very night, this outlaw who her black knights used to chase?

He looks down, swallows, then meets her eyes evenly.“I wanted to see how you’re holding up.”

Her voice goes dark and rough. “I’m not putting myself under a sleeping curse anytime soon, if that’s what you mean.”

“It’s not.”

“Then why—?”

He shifts forward in an instant, lips on her forehead before she has time to expect them, resting there for several seconds. She shivers despite herself, her fingers reaching and searching until they curl into his shirtsleeves and hold on as if to ground her.

“Fine. Come, then.” She tosses the words between them carelessly.

“Thank you.” Robin’s hands frame her face, and the thread of vulnerability in her eyes somehow makes him bolder. He moves slowly, languidly, thumbs skimming back and forth on her cheeks as his lips meet each temple in turn, the top of her cheekbone, linger beneath her eyes on the dark circles that testify to largely sleepless nights, glide over her skin to kiss the tip of her nose. Her palms have fallen down to his forearms, and her arms move limply with each tilt of his. She cannot fathom this, part of her screaming to shove him away, another unable to move.

When he pulls a few inches back, she breathes heavily, her heart pounding. she will not have it, steps between his legs and fuses their mouths together, her tongue pressing into his lips, her teeth clattering against his, her hands fumbling at the tie of her gown and discarding it carelessly.

“A distraction, is this?” Robin asks, fingers curling into Regina’s waist.

“Yes.” She presses a hand into his chest and slides it up from belly to ribs to chest over the thin cotton of his shirt, lifting her gaze as she lifts her hands so that her dark eyes meet his.

…

He can barely make out the flecks of lighter brown in them for the darkness of the room, a few candles flickering on the vanity beside where they stand, and nothing more. In all her Evil Queen regalia, she might scare some, harsh jet jewelry glistening menacingly from her necklace and hairpins and weighty earrings, blood red lips, but she does not scare Robin—those dark eyes, that’s all he needs to see the woman beneath them.

Her hands reach his shoulders and curl firmly around where they meet his neck, and he sucks in a shaky breath, one hand coasting up her back and into her hair. “Really?”

She takes a step towards him at that, the breath of space left between their bodies vibrating with warm air. Her lips brush against his ear, her breasts pressing into his chest until he sinks against the wall behind him as she repeats in a whisper, “a distraction”.

A sharp breath, and he pulls her that half inch closer so that every plane of their bodies touches, his hands gentle despite the intensity of their closeness. “ _You’re_ infuriating, Regina,” he says, the warm cadence slurring the words spoken into the shell of her ear.

“Mm,” she agrees, sweeping her closed lips over his, then finally, finally allowing it to become a kiss.

His hands lift from her waist to cradle the back of her neck, and she leans into him for a moment, unaware until weight lifts from her collar that he has unclasped her necklace and tossed it blindly to the vanity. She breaks from his lips for a moment, but he chases after her, warm breath in pants against her lips, a fingertip tracing the shell of her ear down to the lobe and searching for any other heavy jewelry, his other hand flexing still on her waist as he encourages her to lean her weight onto him, and it frightens her, how soft and gentle he is, as they kiss again, and again, movements slow and predictable and easy. He skims those fingers away from her neck, past the jeweled studs in her ears and into her hair, trying to work out the clasps she’s used to pin heavy curls.

A gasp escapes her lips as he catches a piece of hair in one and it tugs painfully at her skull. “Sorry,” he breathes as he breaks their kiss, his lower lip caught and dragging between hers. As he narrows his eyes and focuses on working strand after strand of hair free of the clasp, Regina digs fingers into his chest and finds trying to distract _him_ fair game, presses her open mouth onto his stubbled jaw once, and, at his stuttering gasp and faltering fingers, does it again, and again, moves down the underside of his jaw to his neck, repeats anything that makes the free hand at her hip flex and the breaths in her ear stutter, revels in his muscled chest and arms under her palms, the stubble rasping against her lips and chin, the heat that works its way through her silk nightgown so much better than it had through leather corsets.

Once she feels the last chunk of hair fall and curl against her back, she reclaims his lips, throwing his shoulders back into the wall with harsh palms and a muffled groan.

She works her hips into his eagerly in answer, gasping at the sensation through her now much scantier clothing, silk and cotton and nothing else between them, each angle of his body defined against her skin. She tangles a hand into the hair at the back of his head and tugs him to meet her lips more firmly, harsh, insistent.

“Still just a distraction?” he rasps.

“Definitely,” she gasps out, her chest heaving.

“Mhm,” he replies, picking up her hand and resting it with his against her chest, over her heart. “Your heart rate right now says differently.”

Her eyebrow arches high, “Did no one ever tell you, thief, that kissing doesn’t mean anything?”

“You don’t believe that,” he whispers, the words breaking up as she begins to trail stockinged toes up his calf. “Not with us. I can tell it’s more than that.”

Her fingers fly to his shirt buttons, her lips trailing harshly after her fingers, teeth nipping at his skin, her face hidden from him. He lets his head drop back in the air, tangles a hand in the curls beside her ear. “What is it about this being something _real_ that would be so terrible?” Her lips freeze against his stomach, and that’s the last thing he wanted.

…

His next thought is that she must have decided to fight the talking out of him, because suddenly she pulls him up to stand straight with her and shoves his shirt down his arms, tossing it aside. Her hands slide along his chest and stomach as her lips single-mindedly devour his, her tongue and teeth sliding and scraping, making his knees weak, as if the violence of her kisses could push her feelings away, his hands holding onto her hips to keep himself from stumbling.

He puts a hand up to her hair to slow her down, caresses the side of her face. Regina wraps a hand around his wrist, turns to kiss the skin there. She shoves him away from her suddenly, the cold startling after the warmth of her body. Her eyes go wide, her breath halted, her legs tripping, stumbling back as she swipes her robe from the ground and yanks it on, tying it firmly around her waist and staunchly refusing to meet his questioning gaze.

“Get out,” she says, her voice ravaged.

He tries to catch her hand, but she yanks it away. “Regina?” he asks. She turns her head farther away.

“Milady,” he continues, ever the gentleman, “if I have given you some offense, please forgive me.”

She looks back at him with wild eyes, her skin flushed and her lips swollen from kissing, her robe wrinkled, her hair free, and Robin drinks in the sight of Regina before she transforms back into the Queen.

“I said, get out!” She waves her hand, and his clothes are off the floor and back on him, though still wrinkled. She’s staring at him, but not at his eyes, and he doesn’t understand what happened, but he obeys. He’s never seen her so terrified, not when Zelena threw her against a stone wall last month, not when flying monkeys came upon their camp in the middle of the night, not when the Dark One held a knife to her throat.

On impulse, he stretches to place a gentle kiss on her forehead, to soothe her as it had minutes before.

A few months later and the impulse will win him an unhurried smile, but here, the fissures in her heart do not want to be filled. They form an abyss, black and hopeless. Even more damning, the twisted way in which her soul revels in it, the darkness, the void Henry’s loss has left behind.

“Leave,” she growls. “ _Now_.”

With a final, pleading look, he obeys, leaving her to her empty chambers and the spluttering candles on the table.

…

Dark, empty, that is what she craves. Robin foils these plans, and she hates him for it, she does not wish to be drawn out or cared for because that only presses the weight of her pain deeper into her chest. This is why she cannot escape him; why he cannot escape her. Why her dark and treacherous and worthless heart wants him.

(A few months more will find him guarding the organ from harm, helping her begin to stitch the fragments of her heart into a whole again.)

Another and he will be part of the reason that the stitches on those cracks in her heart unravel.

.

.

.

Later that night, Regina lingers outside the door to the chambers Robin and Roland share in her castle. She watches Roland curl into Robin’s side, the boy in a nightgown and Robin still in his clothes, though without his boots and jacket. They look peaceful and happy, father and son, sharing their bedtime routine as Robin recites a fantastical and obviously improvised story. Roland giggles at the funny voices Robin uses for the characters, this time the adventures of two best friends, a fox and a rabbit, and Regina aches as she has the strongest memory of lying just so with Henry, back when the Evil Queen was just a character in the stories they read. “Daddy is she coming to tuck me in?” Roland asks. Regina steps back and holds her breath as his father kisses his forehead and says “Maybe tomorrow, my boy.” The clack of her boot heels assaults her ears as she hurries away.

 

**Storybrooke, Present**

When Regina lands in her home, she walks quickly upstairs, depositing boots and coat and scarf in their proper places. She’s halfway to slamming her bedroom door shut when the energy drains out of her, and she presses it shut gently instead. She falls back against the shut door with a sigh, her palms flat on the paneling. Robin’s words still swirl in her head.

She scowls at the thought of him; had sent him away for being so frustratingly right all of the time, for knowing exactly what to say to quell this self-hatred she never wants to admit to, for pushing, always _pushing_ , and force of habit has her pushing back, protecting herself, pushing everyone away, but this man won’t let her. He won’t let her create a reason why he should stay away, nothing has worked. (And she thinks of his embrace, of him holding her and her hand and her heart, and wonders if she had even wanted it to work.) _Love is weakness_ her mother had told her. Poison, like Cora herself, for it has not felt so much like weakness in these past weeks. Giving Robin space, spending time with Henry and Roland and Snow and Tinkerbell, protecting this town, letting Robin embrace her, if only for a moment—these things have made her feel strong, not weak. Powerful. A kind of power her mother could never have experienced, the terrifying power of vulnerability and openness and family and love.

Zelena’s loss is raw tonight, Rumpelstiltskin’s betrayal and manipulation of her, panic at her vulnerability, and she will let herself hide tonight, she will stay here and think of these things and deal with them. She promises herself, though, that in the morning, she will come out of her room and live, because hiding from them all, and from love— _that_ is weakness. Accepting it—that is strength. She will let all of them find her, because she knows, deep down, that they are choosing the same.

So she washes the tears off her face, finds comfortable pajamas, sinks into bed, this comfort she had denied herself for weeks.

Henry holding onto her as she woke, Roland visiting with his stuffed monkey, Snow cooking her dinner, that is what she remembers. Robin’s arms around her middle as they laughed and settled for a nap, naked and sated and falling in love. She lets herself remember, this time, for she has spent weeks pushing these thoughts away, pushing happiness, away. She lets herself revel in all the warmth and joy, and in the sadness and disappointment, all of it, how wonderful it feels to _feel._

When she finally falls asleep, her lips have curved into a smile.

**.**

**.**

**.**

This is almost what Regina had imagined for those short weeks a few months ago.

Henry teaching Roland how to play “War” with a few decks of cards on the living room floor, Robin next to her on the couch as they watch their boys grow acquainted with one another.

Robin had knocked on her door half an hour ago, just as she’d finished cleaning up from brunch with Henry, with a tentative smile and a peace offering—his son. Regina’s mouth had hung open for a second, before she’d glared, half-amused at the tactic and Roland had jumped down to hug her in greeting.

Henry had reached the door behind her, looked between them, and offered to bring Roland into the living room to teach him a game with a significant glance at his mother that read _talk_.

 _When had her little boy grown up so much?_ she’d wondered.

She and Robin have been mostly silent, and she’s relieved at the excuse of watching the game, the reason to stare straight ahead and not at him. Everything else has fallen away except a keen awareness for how close they are, how easy it would be for her to reach out and touch him, speak to him; the not touching and not speaking only makes all of it more intense.

Henry starts her as they lay down the next round. “It’s yours,” he encourages Roland excitedly, pushing the cards towards the other boy. “Take them!”

Roland frowns in concentration, then notices that he has put down a queen of spades to Henry’s three of diamonds. He rips the card off the ground proudly and turns sideways to show it off to Regina and Robin. “Look. A queen!” He turns to Henry. “Your mama is a queen,” he informs him with a nod.

Henry chuckles and shoots Regina a grin. “Yes, she is,” he agrees.

“But you and Papa and I don’t have to call her Your Majesty, because we’re her family.” Roland gasps, his eyes widening. “You’re a prince!” he suddenly realizes, scrambling to sit on his knees. “ _Prince_ Henry.”

“I guess I am,” Henry agrees with the excited boy.

Regina brushes a tear away quickly, trying to ignore Robin’s thumb stroking her shoulder blade, their first touch since he arrived, trying to ignore the sea blue eyes she knows are looking at her with that pitiless kindness and fiery warmth.

Roland climbs onto her lap with a wide grin a minute later, after a few more rounds, his hands on her cheeks. “I won!” he tells her, puffing out his chest.

She clears her throat and turns out of Robin’s touch. “Did you?” She glances behind him at her son and gives him a wink. He must’ve stacked the deck, because, a few minutes ago, Roland had decidedly not been winning.

Roland notices the moisture of tears in her eyes and becomes instantly serious. “Did I make you sad?”

“No, Sweetheart, you didn’t make me sad. You made me happy.”

“Really?” He has grown even since the last time he sat in her lap, she realizes, his face has lost a little of the babyish fat, his limbs longer; they grow so fast at this age.

She smiles. “Really.”

Roland grins and throws his arms around her neck. He’s back up in a heartbeat. “Henry?”

Her son has come to stand beside the couch and squeezes her hand. “Yes?”

“Let’s play again!”

“All right,” Henry chuckles, eager to have an enthusiastic partner. Regina watches them go with a smile.

Robin finally takes her hand in his for a moment. She lets him. “What?” she breathes, watching the boys.

“You know you’re wonderful with them?”

She bites her lip, looking down. “Yes.”

“And that you’ve protected everyone in this town several times over.”

She swallows. “Yes.”

His heavy sigh reaches her cheek. “All right.”

She looks at him in surprise, cannot help it when her eyes flicker down to his wrist.

He catches the glance. “That’s what you saw, that night in the Enchanted Forest, isn’t it?” he guesses.

She sighs, pulling her hand out of his. “Yes.”

He blinks, frowns, runs his palm over the mark. “And in the cabin?”

“Yes.”

“So I _had_ upset you.”

She scrunches one eye half closed, manages to grin at him. “Just a little.”

“ _That’s_ why Tinkerbell was so eager to—“

“Yes,” she interrupts. A brief, pained glance at him.

He slides a palm over her lower back, pulling away almost immediately when he realizes what he’s done, how invasive she might find it. “Do you regret it?”

“What?”

He sighs. “I don’t know—“ he glances down at the cream rug. “Sharing the things that you did with me.”

Regina rests a hand on his wrist for a moment. Tears threaten. She pushes them back, successfully this time, shakes her head. “No.”

He turns to her at that, at the solidity of her voice, when he’d expected—he doesn’t know what he’d expected, but not that.

“Sometimes,” she amends, voice quieter, a little rougher around the edges. (Every time she sees him, she thinks of how he walks around with little pieces of her soul, and she with pieces of his. Her guilt over Daniel, her fears and insecurities, his warm and cheerful exterior that hides a damaged man beneath it. Her love when no man has felt it since Daniel, her body vulnerable and naked with him in ways it has not been with anyone else in her life. Her heart.) “But it doesn’t last long. The regret,” she clarifies, turning on the couch so that she almost faces him. “I can’t regret it.”

A warm half-smile, biting his lower lip, a gesture that might seem shy to her in another context. “I don’t regret it either.”

It has made her feel torn open, wounds leaving her exposed to the world without him there anymore to stop the bleeding. It has made her feel foolish and humiliated. But here he is in her house with his son, clenching his fingers together like he’s trying to resist the urge to hold her hand, not demanding anything, here to see if she’s okay, to cheer her up if he can.

The peace surprises her, slow and drifting into her limbs, the calm that has tiptoed into her veins in the past few hours. She has not felt it in a long time, maybe ever, this sense that she might _want_ this particular part of her life, that she wouldn’t rather be anywhere else. She sinks into the couch and lets herself breathe, exist. The deafening buzz of everything softens into a hum. Their silence for the next twenty minutes as Henry and Roland finish their game is comfortable.

She and Henry accompany them to the door when they leave. Roland gives her a smacking kiss to the cheek as a goodbye.

“Give Regina a goodbye kiss, Daddy!” he demands (When has he learned to say her name properly? He’s growing so fast, just like Henry.)

She swallows, forces a smirk for the boy, and takes Robin’s hand, bends, pressing her lips to the back of it, the calloused pads and joints of his fingers rough against her smooth palm. Robin smiles at her, so warm and loving, crinkles by his eyes and dimples wide as he takes Roland’s hand, and leaves. And she loves him.

When she turns around, Henry’s all smiles.

.

.

.

“I picked a movie for us to watch tonight,” Henry announces after they’ve left, as he and Regina walk back into the house. “Is that okay?”

Regina brushes a few fingers under his chin, barely in need of bending down now; without her heels he’d be perhaps three or four inches shorter than her. “Whatever you want.”

“I want to do something that _you_ want to do.”

She smiles softly, a hand on his shoulder. “Well, I want to spend time with you, so a movie is perfect.”

He buries his face in her collar unexpectedly, arms tight around her waist. “I love you.”

She frowns, bewildered, as she brushes a hand through his hair and tilts her chin on top of his head. “I love you, too, Henry.”

His arms tighten around her. “Henry,” she gasps, trying to pull her head back enough to meet his eyes. “Henry, I’m not going anywhere.”

“You did, though,” he whispers into her shoulder.

“Oh, Henry.” She puts hands on his shoulders to separate them, then tugs him over to the couch so they can sit. How long has he been holding that in, holding this conversation in, waiting for the right moment, or waiting forever because he fears it might upset her?

“I tried to save you, and I, I—“ he chokes over the words, as he had when he first told her.

She tilts his head onto her shoulder, kissing his forehead. “Henry, it’s not your job to save me.”

He shakes his head.

Regina’s arm wraps around his shoulder, holding onto him. “Henry, Sweetheart, I don’t want you to feel guilty, all right? I’m fine now. I’m okay, I promise.”

He sniffs. “I would make a terrible hero. I was so scared.”

“You _are_ a hero. The truest believer. My little prince.”

He frowns. “I didn’t believe so much then.”

“Henry,” she sighs, “it wasn’t because you aren’t enough for me. You know that right?”

“Yeah,” he clears his throat.

They stay like that for several minutes, on the couch, the ticking clock the only sound breaking into the silence. His breathing evens out, and he asks, softly, “Just don’t ever leave me again, okay?”

She fights the tears in her own eyes. “Okay.”

They breathe for a few more minutes, silent and comfortable and together.

“So Robin—“ he begins.

“Henry,” she half-groans.

“What?”

“That’s different from—“

“I heard you,” he interrupts. “That Saturday morning, right after you—when he showed up and you talked. I heard you.”

“That was…“ she searches for words, cannot find them.

“They’re really great. Roland, and Robin. Why won’t you let them be your family, but you’ll let me?”

“Romantic love is different, Henry. I am your mother, and I love you and always will, but romantic love is a choice, and not one someone could easily make with me.”

“He has though,” Henry protests, stubborn (she’s wondered, before, if he’s inherited the trait from Snow, but sometimes he’s so headstrong she has to think he got a second dose from her), “I heard him, and he has. You used to be a villain, but you aren’t anymore. We all see that. Why can’t you?”

“I don’t get a gold star for sacrifice, Henry. That’s not what good is. You taught me that. I’ve done so many bad things thinking I was protecting you, when all I was doing was hurting you, and pushing you farther away.”

He shrugs, and it disarms, startles her. “I’ve forgiven you for all of that,” he tells her, lifting his head from her shoulder so he can find her eyes.

“Why?”

“Because I love you,” he explains, settling back against her, “and you love me.”

_Is it really so simple as that?_

“I am sorry, Henry.” She lets the tears go this time, knows herself to be unable to stop them, when it comes to him. “I truly am.”

“I know.” He squeezes his arms around her middle. “I believe in you. Do you?”

She sinks back against the cushions, surprising herself with the hint of a smile peeking through her heavy expression. _Maybe I’m starting to_ , she thinks.

“How about the movie right now?”

“All right,” she agrees, squeezing his shoulder, the strain of the conversation easing away into comfort.

“And ice cream?”

“At—“ she glances at the clock on the mantle, “noon?”

He nods eagerly. “One scoop?” he pleads.

“You had lunch with Roland half an hour ago.”

“I’m growing!” he argues.

“Are you certain you won’t spoil your dinner?”

“I’m a teenage boy, Mom. We eat a lot.”

She mocks a long-suffering sigh. “All right.”

“Two scoops?” he tries.

She smirks, narrowing her eyes playfully. “Don’t push your luck.”

“Fine, Mom,” he groans, adds brightly, “love you!” throwing his arms around her for another hug, lighter this time, happy.

She lets out a breath, and with it some of the fear and the pain. “I love you, Henry.”

 

 

**Storybrooke, Three Months Ago**

 

When Robin finds her and Henry on the docks, the memories rushing into her mind have been mostly of her son, of missing him and the pain and hopelessness, of the unspeakable joy now of having him back. ( _Nothing much_ , _nothing that matters now—_ for she could not bear for him to know what it cost her, this year, Mom is supposed to be invulnerable. And she’s _Mom_ again, and there really isn’t anything that matters more than that.) Henry teases her, insists, calls her _Mom_ again, reminds her of the rather pleasant half hour she spent in the hallway at Granny’s this morning, rendered perfect by the fact that Henry will never call her Madam Mayor again, and she cannot help the flutter in her stomach, the smile spreading on her face. _Robin…Hood._

Then he walks in and shakes Henry’s hand, her son thrilled at the idea that his mom is dating this hero, and she’d been certain moments before that this thing between them would survive the memories, but fear trembles a little in her gaze; she had been, after all, often quite terrible to him. He’s here, though, isn’t he? She smiles, laughs at Henry’s _Awesome!_. Robin came to find her.

_So…the curse is broken._

He nods, his brow raising, side-eyeing her a little. _Indeed._ _And the missing year—things were a bit rocky between us, yeah?_ (To say the least, she thinks, watching the uncertain curve of his lips, his sideways glance, the determination above all to follow her anyway.)

Flirting with him comes easy, lighter without the pain they both know kept them apart in the Enchanted Forest. _For some reason, you’re so much more likable here in Storybrooke,_ and he gives her that awful, irresistible grin, lets her get away with teasing, bites his bottom lip. Brings up other memories that have sprung back into both their minds, and as she holds onto both Henry and Robin, she sighs at Robin’s hand on her back, reaching up to brush at the ends of her hair, at Henry leaning into her side, and nothing could be better.

Warmth still spreads through her at Henry’s excitement, at his unhesitating, unflinching joy when he cried “Mom!”, at his stockpile of eager stories about how he missed her even though he didn’t know it, how the mayor’s mansion is home, how he wants to share with her all his victories at school and New York City pizza and his friends.

Henry leaves her at the doorway for a visit to Neal’s grave with a promise to return soon. She tries to hide the way it makes her feel bereft.

Robin puts a hand at her waist once Henry’s out of sight, presses a soothing kiss to her hair. “Are you all right?”

She nods, her face still turned away from him, and it’s nearly the truth—she will be, Henry will be back, and they’ll find some way to defeat Zelena.

“I’m glad I’m more likable in Storybrooke,” he hums, the vibrations of his voice rumbling against her back.

She’s suddenly strangely thankful for having lost her memories, for the opportunity to give this another go, in a place where she isn’t so emotionally devastated that any new relationship would be doomed to failure. For the chance to see her soulmate and think it a blessing rather than a curse, a second chance rather than a taunting reminder of the happy life she would never have. For the chance he’s giving her now to put it behind them. 

 _He stayed_ is all she can think as she slides her palms over his and moves them from her hips to her belly. She pushed him and he stayed anyway, her soulmate; he must be meant for her, if he could tell through it all that she was in too much pain to be reached. (He tried anyway, her heart flutters treacherously in her chest, he stayed and tried anyway.) Her hand slides onto his right wrist, lingers there, and the words struggle to fight their way out, to tell him. Too strange, though, to feel without her heart; muffled, warped. She will tell him later; she promises herself, she will tell him as soon as her heart once again beats in her chest.

She squeezes his forearm instead, smiles, her cheek pressed against his, and turns in his arms to give him a kiss as her answer, short, open-mouthed, eager, smiles more at the fingers digging into her hair. (They had kissed and kissed this morning, had not managed to separate for long minutes stretching into half an hour after they reached Granny’s, but then they had known each other for mere weeks, and now they know that it has been over a year, that their blissful first kiss—wasn’t their first kiss.) 

“You were still quite a good kisser,” he confesses with a wink when they part, kissing the inside of her wrist tenderly. _And he’s still quite fond of my hair_ she thinks, but doesn’t say it; doesn’t feel like teasing him; tenderness wells up over that urge, soothing and warm and she could not bear to soil the peace with memories that leave a bitter taste in her mouth.

She laughs instead, leans into him, high on the joy of it, this day, Zelena is threatening all of their lives, there is much to be done, but none of that has to matter for this moment, and she is happy.

 

**Storybrooke, Present**

 

“What is this?” Regina inquires, eyeing the brown paper bag in one hand and bottle of red wine in the other.

The fairy gives her a withering look. “A friend can’t bring another friend dinner and a bottle of wine?”

“Tinkerbell,” Regina warns.

“Come on, I know you don’t have Henry again until tomorrow morning.” She lifts the bag of food in her hands. “It’s good. Promise.”

Regina catches a whiff of frying oil and potato. “It’s from Granny’s, isn’t it?”

“I said it was good, Regina,” Tink answers archly, pressing the wine bottle into Regina’s hands, “I didn’t say _I_ made it.”

Regina scowls, a grin peeking through in spite of herself. “I make better food than Granny.”

“Then make dessert,” Tinkerbell suggests as she pushes the door open another half foot and enters without any further invitation, tossing her boots haphazardly near the front door.

“I thought I didn’t have a kid around until tomorrow?” Regina grumbles, squatting in her stilettos to pick up the boots and set them in a neat line on the mat.

Tink throws an amused glare over her shoulder on her way to the kitchen. “If you want to get rid of me you’re going to have to try a lot harder than that.” She opens the proper cupboard and begins to retrieve plates and wine glasses.

“Fine,” Regina sighs, her frustration half-hearted at best.

“Good,” Tink replies brightly.

 

**The Enchanted Forest, Ten Months Into the Missing Year**

 

Regina finds herself falling into step beside him as they dismount their horses just outside Rumpelstiltskin’s castle. She does not notice until his voice sounds in her ear, “Are you all right?”

She flinches; her _soulmate,_ why is fate always so cruel to her, taunting, laughing at her.

(But he is not, that genuine concern in his voice; he wants the real answer. He’s not laughing, not taunting. But she is scarred, she did not go into the tavern, _you ruined his life_ , and he will hate her, if for nothing else then for that.)

She cannot have it, his concern. Amazing, that she has not done something sick and twisted and wrong enough that he is taken away from her, or worse, that he runs, but she will, she’s certain. She always does.

He tries to protect her (she has to admit it; he saves her arm), and she cannot help it, grows bitter and biting, hurls nonsensical insults at this foolish man. The regret surprises her, saddening, weak, she wishes so much that it did not have to be like this, and when she finds his eyes before turning away, something of that regret burns in his eyes as well, as if he wants it to be different, too, or worse, as if he’s seeing right through it all.

 

 

**Storybrooke, Present**

 

Snow invites Regina to dinner the night Henry is set to move over for a few days with Emma. So she can spend some extra time with him, before saying goodbye for the evening, she explains. A decision easily made.

When they finish eating, Regina is loathe to leave. She helps Snow clear dishes as they watch Henry and Emma fawn over baby Neal, who sits on David’s lap, giggling. “Neal’s going to be worn out tonight, with all of that attention.”

Snow grins. “Oh, I depend on it. He was up five times last night.”

“Henry caught a cold at about this age,” Regina shares. “He spent one night waking every twenty minutes, every time I put him down.” She sighs, smiling at the memory, though it was not the most pleasant of nights at the time. “So we slept in the rocking chair.”

Snow gives her that knowing look, warm and satisfied, pleased she’s caught a happy mood.

“Oh shut up,” Regina grumbles.

“I didn’t say anything,” Snow protests, pushing the dishwasher completely shut with her hip. She follows Regina to the empty couch, smiling at the rest of her family as she goes. “Henry’s gotten so tall these past few months.”

“Yes, Regina agrees, “though…not as much as he grew while we were away,” she laments.

Snow squeezes her hand. “But we’re here now.”

“Ever the optimist.”

“Mm-hm. Speaking of which, Henry says Robin came over for a few hours last weekend?”

“And Roland,” Regina objects.

Snow seems amused at the addition. “Yes, I heard.”

Regina clears her throat, changing the subject. “I’m glad you have this, now, Snow.”

Snow sighs happily. “Me, too.”

“I don’t understand…I mean, for Henry, but why are you always including me in—“

“Because you’re family, too.” Snow smiles kindly, “I knew that the woman who saved me was in there,” she puts a hand on Regina’s shoulder, just for a moment, “and now she’s back. I missed her a lot. We’ve both done things we regret, horrible things, but I meant what I said. It’s time to put the past behind us.”

Regina finds herself in an embrace, not necessarily unexpected, because she knows Snow, but just a little while ago the woman wouldn’t have dared. As it is she knows better than to hold on for too long, especially after Regina hugs her back, and she lets her go after a few seconds.

Neal begins to fuss in Emma’s arms. Regina stands, giving Snow a brief and inscrutable gaze, half a smile and half something else entirely.

“All right,” she tells David, “my turn with the baby.”

Emma hands him over carefully, but immediately. _How things have changed._

She bounces the baby in her arms, and he’s gurgling and grinning again in half a minute.

“You’re his favorite, other than Mom and Dad,” David tells her.

“Am I?”

“Definitely,” Emma agrees.

Regina turns to Neal, brushing a finger down his chubby cheek. “Hello little one.”

Snow joins them, squeezing onto the armchair next to David like the lovesick idiots Regina knows they’ll always be. “I’m not surprised. She’s always been good with children.”

Regina looks up from the baby to Snow.

Zelena may be gone, her mother and her daddy and her first love. But she does have family in town.

 

 


	14. Chapter 12: Fire

**_Chapter 12_ **

**Storybrooke, Present**

Marian grins as Roland continues to string the laces through his boots on his own. It's taken him five minutes so far, and she's betting another five before he's completed the task; but then, it's not as if she'll have to explain to Robin why they're late to the park. He's well aware of their son's stubbornness. She makes another offer of help that is, predictably, vehemently rejected. "I've _got_ it, Mama," he insists as he pushes the laces through another hole.

"Your Papa is going to wonder where we are."

Marian chuckles, then heads to the closet for his down coat and her maroon wool one, five times warmer than her cloak of the same color from the Enchanted Forest, much more practical for her, as are the blue-black jeans and tan t-shirt she's wearing, no corset, no long and heavy skirt to get in the way. She sits on the edge of the bed to zip up her black leather boots, and as she stands she feels powerful, free.

She's still living in a room at Granny's, but she has found a home for them, a small place at the end of Main Street that will do very well; two or three blocks from Snow White and her husband, who have promised to help her sort out all of the legal rules of this world. They will leave this room behind next Friday, a week from tomorrow.

It is odd, still, but so refreshing, that nobody in this world thinks twice of allowing a single woman to purchase her own home, or live alone with her child. That she can be independent here, not only with a choice between an abusive fiancée and an outlaw on the run, but with the chance to choose herself. She cannot regret Robin, loved him with all her heart, loves him still, could not possibly regret their son, but the possibilities are dizzying here, and a few weeks after the moment of heartbreak she'd known in her soul was coming since minutes after she arrived here, she's begun to value them, and seek them, and heal.

Roland finally finishes, hopping up with a "See, Mama!" and a dimpled grin that costs her heart a pang—she misses Robin, terribly, every day, especially at these moments when she sees little echoes of him in their child, and how she wishes they could've been the family they were something like six months ago for her—five years ago for him.

She shakes her head, brushing the errant tear away before Roland sees it, and smiles at him. "Good job!" she exclaims. He's missed one of the holes on one boot, and it's sitting a little crooked on his ankle, but if he doesn't mind, she's certainly not going to point it out to him. "Let's go!"

As they reach the bottom of the stairs, Ruby waves at them, and she waves back. She's been helping with the hotel several hours a day for the past month, for decent pay, with a promise from Ruby and Granny both that they will help her find a more permanent job in time, when the rush wears down from the crowds brought here by the new curse and Elsa's winter.

Robin's sitting on the park bench when they arrive, and he has an instant smile for Roland. Marian has the boy for a few days yet, according to their temporary agreement, meant to last until Roland starts school in the fall, but he'd missed Roland, and Roland had missed him, and so they'd agreed on a joint playdate so that father and son could see each other.

After Roland has jumped at his father and been caught in a bear hug, Robin catches his foot. "Have you been lacing your own boots again, my boy?"

"Yes, Papa," Roland says proudly, his arms around Robin's neck.

"That's why we're late, actually," Marian informs him, reminding Robin of her presence. She pushes away the ungenerous anger, frustration, hurt, at the way they sometimes don't seem to notice her when they all three meet—they have spent years, she has to remind herself, just the two of them. But it hurts nonetheless.

Robin catches her eye, gives her a sad smile. "Why don't you go explore the playground," he tells Roland, setting the boy back on his feet.

"Okay!" Roland agrees eagerly.

"You look well," he tells her.

"Thank you," she answers, a little quieter and rougher than she'd like, and she blinks back the moisture in her eyes, because she really _is_ well, and better, adjusting. It's all getting easier, slowly but most certainly, and she knows from looking at herself in the mirror that her skin looks less sallow than it has in months, her eyes less tired. Marian swallows back the tightness in her throat at the moment, and looks at him. really looks, takes in the little signs she still knows—his shoulders arched in, lips pursed, teeth digging into his lower lip. "Though I'm not sure you do."

He arches an eyebrow at her, and she lets out a relieved breath. They may have to re-navigate all of this, but some things still work as they had—he still likes her honesty, and she still gives it easily.

"Why are you alone?"

His brow furrows. "Here?"

"No." It is an easy assumption to make, for he looks unhappy, weary. "Why are you—you are not _with_ her?"

"No." He scoffs, not at all happy, not at all laughing, not easy, as she is used to him being.

"Why?"

"You know that…us, we weren't—it wasn't so that I could go running to—"

"I know," she assures him. She looks at her lap, plays with her hands, and tries to ignore the way he stares at her, but when she finally looks back up his eyes are on her, wide, curious.

"What's holding you back?" she asks. (She still wants it to be her, but it isn't, she knows it isn't, her mind has made peace with that fact, even if her heart hasn't.)

He swallows. "Her," he answers. After a moment of hesitation he changes his answer, "Me," shakes his head at himself and finally settles on, "both of us."

"I assumed you would be," she confesses. "With her, by now," she clarifies.

"I don't know if it's possible to fix what we…" he trails off.

"I know you, Robin," she catches his hand and squeezes it for a moment before letting go, "you have always had such courage. And it takes courage to go after what you want—and courage to let yourself be happy. I wish it could—" she swallows heavily, "I wish it could be with me, but if that's not to be, I can't watch you so unhappy when it might be fixed." ( _Love him enough to let him go,_ she repeats to herself, as she has over and over, to keep her resolve, to refrain from pleading with him for herself; it has worked, so far, some days better than others.)

"I'm not sure I'm quite as courageous as you once thought I was."

"Well, I know that you are."

He gives her a smile then, and she sees with relief that it reaches his eyes. "You have been so much more generous with me than I deserve."

"Even if that were true, it would be my pleasure." Robin frowns, and Marian has to grin to herself, if a little uneasily, her brow knit. "You are so _stubborn._ Both of you."

"I know."

"No wonder Roland prefers to lace up such complicated boots by himself and run around uncomfortable rather than ask for help." She almost chokes on the words by the end, each time she sees him it reminds her how raw the wound still is, but she must, for Roland, she must.

"I'm so sorry, Marian," he whispers.

She shakes her head. "You don't have to—don't apologize anymore, all right? I do love you, and that means I want you happy, and if you're not in love with me anymore, neither of us will be happy, together." (And this she has repeated to herself, over and over again, until she could even venture to honestly believe that it is true.)

"You deserve every happiness," he whispers, his voice raw, not daring to meet her eyes.

She cups his jaw with one hand for a moment, her arm stretched so that they're not too close, encourages him to look at her. "So do you."

A scuffling sound interrupts them; Roland has tripped on his mis-tied shoe. They both rise quickly, but the boy is fine, not crying, uninjured, eyeing his shoe with a glare that, Marian thinks to herself with a bittersweet laugh, would make Regina proud.

"You go," Robin tells her.

She squeezes his hand briefly. "She might deserve to be happy, too, you know?" She phrases it as a question for ease, but she cannot deny it, to the woman who has saved her son's life, who gave up her own life to save Marian's, and to protect the town she had once cursed; and after all, Regina's happiness does not come at the cost of Marian's, for Robin has not been hers for much longer than he has been Regina's. Marian's anger has eased enough to admit that, even if her heart has not.

She turns and walks to their boy, preparing to coax him into letting her help, not expecting anything other than an exasperated _Mama_ , but she won't mind in the least.

.

.

.

That night, after Robin finishes supper with the Merry Men, he finds a seat a little ways off, eager for a few moments alone to think. But then, thinking is all he seems to do these days, of how not to hurt the people he loves, of how to help Regina heal. He does not want to push too hard, this is not about him, or them, it is about her believing that she deserves joy and love and family, as he has always known she does. (She had begun to believe it, that first time she kissed him in these very woods; she had believed it even more when she broke the curse with Henry, and when they put her heart back in her chest and spent that afternoon by her fire.) But what—after all of this—what will help her believe, now?

The crack of breaking twigs interrupts him, and when he looks up at the sound of what is certainly a squirrel or bird, as he had been when Tinkerbell and Rumpelstiltskin came to help him save her, he is haunted by the memory of her breaking through these trees, such courage. She would not call it that, but it was, to finally do something about the pull they both felt between them, to trust herself enough to try for happiness.

He stands suddenly, determined. He will talk to her, explain, make sure she understands how their magic saved her, how much he craves every part of her, how much they need each other. It may not win their relationship back, heavens knows if he even deserves that, but it might just bring back her hope.

.

.

.

Regina stands in complete darkness except for the moonlight. Her arms are crossed tight in front of her, her back resting against her apple tree, eyes down, a slim black peacoat buttoned and tied around her, not warm enough for the bitter night chill. Exhausted, and unable to sleep, she feels weary of all of it, the guilt of pushing Robin away, the ache of missing him, smiling at memories when she could have new ones, and she wishes she could be brave enough to let all of it go and _be_ with him.

Robin has the practiced, quiet footsteps of a thief whose life has often depended on stealth, and so she does not notice him until he stands barely fifteen feet away. Her head whips up at the sound of his heavy breathing, and her eyes find his.

"Robin," she gasps, startled. She fights to school her expression into something tamer, less raw, draws her arms from around her chest and stands straight. "I'm sorry. I know that we haven't had a chance to—" she trails off at the intensity of his gaze. He's been walking to her this whole time, and he's before her now.

Robin takes hold of her jacket lapels and hauls her mouth to his with a gasping breath.

His mouth opens over hers, inelegant, too eager, but their bodies react as they always have, melt together, and after a moment, Regina gasps into his mouth, her knees weak and bending into his, stumbling on her heeled boots, unbalanced, the world spinning.

Robin tears his mouth away just as she presses her front into his, both of them huffing relieved breaths, he's staring into her eyes, his melted and warm and dark dark blue in the light, a little fearful. She feels so _alive,_ energy skittering through her veins,she can hardly breathe from the rush.

And then she surges back to him, catching his lips, her palms on his jaws, fingers digging into his cheeks, the force of the contact making them both stumble. His hand buries into her hair, the other pressing between her shoulder blades to bring her closer, and they kiss and kiss, Regina wrapping her arms around his neck. She has _missed_ this, the taste of him and the feel of his skin, her nails biting into his shoulder blades, the way his breath catches when she changes the angle of the kiss to deepen is fervent and frantic, adrenaline racing, limbs and hands shaky, heart pounding.

Regina ends the kiss almost as quickly as she'd begun it, yanking back from him, fear in her wide eyes. _Nobody ever stays_ , loving is pain and weakness, loneliness and before she has realized it, she's frozen, staring, panting with panic instead of relief and desire. But Robin won't let her, moves his hands from her to cover her own, still on his shoulders, threading his fingers between hers, holding tight, moving them down and pressing them to his heart.

"Feel that?" he pants, and Regina gasps, tears gathering in her eyes that she absolutely refuses to let fall, panic making her dizzy, joy making her weak. His heartbeat a few inches beneath her fingers, it is power and love and strength. "My heartbeat. That's all you."

Her fingertips curl into his chest almost of their own will, the thud of his racing heart echoing that of her own.

One of his hands leaves hers to cradle her face. "What is it?"

The concern in his eyes and his voice has her shockingly close to tears, her words pleading where she'd meant them to be harsh, a last ditch attempt, he cannot, this cannot—"The only people who have ever stayed are the ones I forced."

He slides his hand around her neck and tilts her forehead onto his. She lets him. "That's not true." His hand shakes against her skin as he talks, holding her and pushing her all at once. "Not Henry, not Snow White or her husband or their baby, not Tinkerbell, or Roland. And _certainly_ not me."

She lifts her head, her eyes flitting back and forth over his face, unsettled. His warm breath washes over her face, shocking against her cheeks cold from over an hour spent outside. "Why would you, why would _anyone_ bother to care about—? _"_

A growl rumbles in his throat, and then he's backing her into the tree, their lips pressed together in a bruising kiss, his hand cradling the back of her head to keep it off the rough bark. Her mouth responds of its own volition, her tongue pressing into his mouth and her teeth scraping against his bottom lip. He groans, pressing into her until she feels nothing but the knotted bark on her shoulders and back and the planes of his legs and chest against hers. Everything so present and real, flames lit in the darkness, and neither of them will remember this moment because it is too fleeting to be stored away, but that's all right, they will kiss a thousand times more.

He tears his mouth away, panting, "Regina, the magic, it was—I had to—," he tilts her head softly towards his until their foreheads bump together, grasps one of her hands and cradles it back to his chest, over his heart. "I had to want all of it back, Regina," her name a caress that has her shivering and letting her eyes flutter shut for a moment, "not just the happiness and the light. I had to love every bit of your soul enough to bring you back. I had to hold onto every hurtful thing I've ever said to you, every hurtful thing you've said to me. Everything I know about you and everything I don't yet. I had to grasp all of it, want all of it. _Love_ all of it." He's pressing, pushing as if he might sink into her if he could, his hand now over her heart. "You can feel it, can't you? That you would do that for me?"

She sucks in a breath, her head spinning, it cannot be the same, can it? "Yes, but you're—"

"Utterly in love with you?" he interrupts, one hand carding through her hair, the other running up and down from her hip to her waist over her coat. "If I liked using theatrics to prove a point as much as you, I'd tell you to take out my heart and see how I do when it's in your hands. I promise you I'm no better."

"Robin," she gasps. "I'm—"

"What? What's holding you back?" He traces a finger over her cheekbone, across her nose, over her lips. "We've danced around this long enough."

She feels herself shaking her head, says weakly, "I'm a villain—and villains don't get happy endings."

"You don't believe that. You're not a villain, you are everything you have been, a lonely child and a princess in love with the stable boy and a young woman in mourning and a neglected bride and a step mother and queen, and an evil queen, and a mother and protector and lover, and you are my soul mate and my love. You are all of that. So don't you dare reduce yourself to just one of them." He's pressing her hand into her heart, running a thumb gently back and forth over her fingers.

She stares, tears shining in her eyes, and then the fingers of her free hand curl and she yanks his lips back onto hers with her hands twisted in his shirt, stands on her toes, pushes her body into his. His arms come around her waist to steady her and he holds her so close that his fingertips brush against his own ribs. She kisses him, and kisses him, with everything, fire and sunlight and darkness, her whole soul, she opens herself back to it willingly, and for reasons she'll never understand, he loves all of it, and she all of him. (Perhaps this isn't meant to be understood. Perhaps fate and destiny are names given to the inexplicable, perhaps this just _is._ )

She's gasping, and after a moment realizes it's because she's not breathed well in minutes, has forgotten to, cannot fill her lungs with the way their bodies press so tightly together, but she doesn't care, she's not leaving, never, he's not leaving, he hasn't left, someone has finally stayed.

He must notice the panting, gasping half-breaths because he separates their lips, holding her as close as ever. Regina chases after him, eyes half-lidded. He turns to nudge his nose against her cheek, his forehead tilting against her temple as he breathes her in. His stomach rises against hers, slow, deep breaths, her arms slide around his neck and she nuzzles into his forehead, smiling at last, noses brushing, breathes in the scent of pine and damp and firesmoke that always clings to him.

He cradles her jaw with one hand, twists fingers into her hair. "I love you."

She pulls back a little, a few tears in her eyes and in his, stares at him. Smiles. Laughs. All but dives at him, almost knocks him over, doesn't care, as she throws her arms around him and buries her face in his neck. "I love you," she whispers into his skin. He catches his balance, holds her close.

A breeze rushes past them, and Regina shivers in his arms, her hands cold, her cheeks flushed red when she lifts her head. (Her eyes sparkling; dizzy, content.)

"Your hands are freezing," she tells him as his hands slide up her waist and move to her neck.

"How could you tell? You're even colder."

She narrows playful eyes at him. (She hasn't felt it, not while she stood out here on her own, and not for the last several minutes, but now she could admit that her warm house and a roaring fire appeal.) "Are you trying to get yourself invited into the house?"

He kisses the corner of her mouth, a little smug, but not so smug that she'll take issue. "Maybe."

"Roland?"

"Not with me until the end of the weekend. Is Henry—?"

"At Emma's."

He skims his hands across her shoulders, down her arms, intertwines their fingers. "Then I'm not ready to let go of you just yet."

.

.

.

When they reach the kitchen, Robin offers to boil water for tea. (It will become a habit, a tradition, after fights, after separations, when they've spent too little time together or felt distant, to make tea and lean against the counter or sit on the couch or in bed and talk.)

Regina sheds her coat and high-heeled boots, heading towards the foyer to hang both hers and his on the coat rack, dropping his shoes on the mat beside hers as he pads around her kitchen in wool socks, the shiver of memory of the day they spent here after Zelena's defeat not entirely unpleasant. His things beside hers, it makes this feel like _home,_ somehow.

She stops for a moment, lets her shoulders rest against the wall, shuts her eyes, and for a horrible second what she remembers is returning to the house that night and collapsing against the door, and she shudders, an echo, she has to remind herself to breathe through it, but instead of standing here and panicking she forces herself to go back to him. Fighting the despair has become easier every day since he woke her, and hope may terrify her, but it wells up in her heart. Love, choosing to share her life with someone, that has felt like weight for decades, a burden dragging her to the lowest depths, to the darkness inside her. It is just as heavy now, but not so burdensome; loving and being loved is a weight that makes her feel alive and whole, warm the way steaming mugs of tea soothe the throat and hands, warm the way a roaring fire banishes the chill on a cold night, warm without dispelling the darkness, warm through learning how to live within it.

Still, the smile that's been on her face since their last kiss fades a little, her joy shakier than it had felt moments ago, and so she trusts in her new promise in herself, her new faith, and lets herself find him.

She concentrates on her feet sinking into the plush carpet with each step, until she's on kitchen tile.

Robin holds out a steaming mug. Her stomach is turning in on itself, her hands shaking; she waits for him to see. A click of pottery set on granite, another, and he surrounds her, his palms pressing into her back and her face in his shirt and his in her hair, the scent of him fills her nose, and she's breathing again. His fingers thread through her hair, his lips resting against the shell of her ear. He clings to her every bit as tightly as she clings to him. (If she notices a few of his tears dampening her temple and her hair, she does not mind, lets free a few of her own.)

"I need—," he whispers into her ear, his voice ravaged, breaking off. His hands run up and down her back, trying to press her closer, or to touch everywhere at once, no space remains between them, her chin hooked on top of his shoulder.

"Stay," she offers, twisting a hand into the hair at the nape of his neck. Neither of them can get enough; after their first kiss in Storybrooke they'd been forever touching, for the comfort, the pleasure, and now that they can, again, none of it's enough.

"I don't want to—," he struggles to explain, "Tonight, I don't think we should—but I—can I hold you while we sleep?"

She nods into his shoulder, and this has gotten too heavy; she pulls away, laughing through the tears as he kisses her brow.

"What?" he asks of the hands cradling his jaw, her tearful, joyful smile.

She shakes her head, all out of teasing remarks. Another day. Her hand curls around his as she turns around and pulls him towards the stairs.

(It will become a tradition, as well, that while they make the tea before they talk, they don't always drink it.)

.

.

.

Regina does not wish to use magic to change her clothes—this feels surreal, and she does not need to make it worse—and there is something delightfully intimate and domestic about this, however awkward and stilted. In the end, they turn their backs on each other, and Regina exchanges her black suit pants and silk blouse for pajamas. Robin settles for tossing away his belt and scarf and sweater, leaving him in a cotton T-shirt and trousers.

Regina quirks an eyebrow at him. "Will that be comfortable?"

He shrugs, and the absurdity of this, the prudishness hits her.

"Nothing I haven't seen before," she grumbles, throwing back the covers and climbing into bed, "get over yourself."

She can hear his smirk in his mock-frustrated huff of breath, her cheek pressed into her pillow, and then he's crawling into bed beside her in just a T-shirt and boxers.

The silk sheets feel particularly cool in contrast to his warm body, his palm spread on her belly to hold her to him, his bare knees against the back of hers, his nose in her hair.

She covers his hand with her own, sighing, both of them asleep in minutes.

.

.

.

Regina stands from her desk the next morning at the knock on her door. She half expects, hopes that it will be Robin, but when she opens the door, Tinkerbell is standing there with her hand raised to knock again.

"Dinner tonight?" she asks.

"I—can't."

Tinkerbell's brow furrows, and Regina fights the girlish blush that will give her away, the eager grin she knows spreads on her face like wildfire.

The fairy wastes no time. "Have you talked to Robin lately, Regina?" she wonders.

"What's it to you?" Regina's blush darkens.

"So you have then," Tinkerbell guesses.

" _Tinkerbell_ ," she warns, but her voice sounds pleased even to her own ears.

"Oh!" and then she has an armful of fairy.

"If you say 'I told you so', I swear—"

Tinkerbell hops out of the hug, her hands squeezed into gleeful fists, her shoulders high, standing on the balls of her feet. "I wouldn't dare," she promises with a smile. "We'll do dinner another time."

"I have work to do," Regina answers, clearing her throat.

"Of course you do," Tinkerbell agrees, nodding. "Oh, I'm so so happy for you. For both of you."

"Tink!"

"I'm going, I'm going." She backs out of the door, waggling her fingers at Regina as she goes.

.

.

.

That night, Robin shows up on Regina's doorstep with dinner. They eat together in her kitchen, mostly in silence, or speaking of Henry and Roland, and it is awkward, awkward as they have never been.

He has brought pajamas this time, and so when they get in bed it is with more layers separating them, and it feels like the distance is growing, she has to stop it.

She turns around in his arms, and kisses him, open-mouthed and wanting and pleading, and he does not disappoint, opens his mouth to her tongue when it swipes over the seam of his lips, kisses back. They kiss again and again, panting, Regina wrapping a leg on top of his. She rocks her hips into his once, shivering, her intent perfectly clear, and then he's pulling his mouth from hers, stilling her hips with both hands.

"Robin," she whines.

"It doesn't feel right," he sighs, his thumb stroking back and forth against the exposed skin of her hip, "running back into your bed."

She looks at him pointedly, then at the pillows and sheets beneath them.

"You know what I mean," he sighs, smirking despite himself "I don't want you to think that that's why—you deserve for this to be gentle and tender, not another man forcing his way into your life and jumping into your bed."

Sweet, perhaps, but unnecessary, and she wants him to touch her, to crush this hateful distance between them, but she also does not want to push, feels a little hesitant is exhausted, months and months of sleeplessness have finally caught up with her, and she drifts off with her head tucked into Robin's chest.

.

.

.

When she wakes the next morning, Robin's staring at her. _Into_ her, like he always has.

"Good morning," he sighs, both of them warm and cozy, with his calloused palm on her back under her silk pajama top.

"Good morning," she returns, bringing her hands up to hold his face. Tears shine in her eyes, but she smiles through it, and drags him down for a kiss, lazy, his fingertips skimming across the shoulder not pressed into the mattress, his knees knocking into hers beneath the silk sheets.

When she pulls back after a moment, he chases after her for a final peck, tips his forehead onto hers. "Are you all right?"

She puts the pad of her pointer finger on his closed lips, adds the rest of her fingers, his stubble prickling against her palm, and nods. In the morning light just beginning to filter in through her curtains, inches away from Robin's sea-blue eyes, his concerned smile, his upper teeth digging into his lip, his voice a little rough with sleep, she cannot fathom another reason for hesitation; she is safe with him, she will _always_ be safe with him.

Regina lifts her weight onto one elbow, sitting up, throwing a leg over his so that she can settle into his lap with a sigh, the silk sheets falling off her back and into a heap. "Perfect," she breathes.

He brings his hands to her hips as he scoots back until he's sitting up, back and shoulders against the headboard, cushioned by a few pillows.

She cards a hand through his hair, met with a smile that mirrors hers, a little teary-eyed, warm, tender, and she spreads her fingers on his neck, tilting his head back for a kiss.

He goes willingly, his palms skating over her lower back, bunching the silk there, baring strips of skin at her waist which calloused thumbs immediately find and caress. She lifts up to kiss him more deeply, her tongue pressing into his mouth.

"Regina," he croaks—they've kissed plenty of times in the last few days, but not like this, not in bed with Regina in his lap and dragging her lips down the underside of his jaw, not pressed together with nothing to separate them but flimsy cotton and silk pajamas, rucking up clothes to find bare skin, and he cannot remember why he felt so hesitant either, needs her now. He stares at the desire pooling in her dark eyes, her flushed cheeks, the scar above her lip, the vein on her forehead, her hair tousled from sleep. "You are so beautiful," he breathes, and he means to take his time with her, to treat her with the reverence and tenderness she deserves, but they have to eliminate this last bit of distance between them, and return to each other wholly and completely.

She rocks her hips into him in answer, palms splayed on his chest to support the movement, pleasure rippling up and through her. She does it again, shivering at the way his hips jerk up in response, at the groan tumbling from his lips.

His hands slide from her hips to her belly, fingertips edging under her shirt, cold against her warm skin. "May I?" He tugs at the bottom of the shirt with a few fingers (could have merely asked with his hands on her skin and a questioning gaze and not with words, but he'd wanted to be clear; wonders if anyone she's been with has ever asked before touching and taking).

"Mm," she hums her permission, working her hips down onto his again, the perfect angle this time to have his hardness wedged just against where she's grown wet and warm. He moans in her ear.

When his hands do not move she adds _yes_ in a breathy huff of air, reaches a hand down to grasp his and places it on the top button, near her collar. She feels every bit of warmth through the silk, but not at all enough of his skin, not enough where her nipples brush against the inside of her shirt.

A sharp intake of breath interrupts their kiss as his wrist grazes over her breast, the top button of her shirt grasped between his thumb and forefinger.

"Robin," she whines, his hand has abruptly left just as she was arching into him. She drags him forward with fingers buried in his hair, and he diverts his lips from hers at the last moment, mouths over her neck instead, tasting the skin there.

Only when the fabric gapes does she realize he's undone the first two buttons at the base of her shirt.

She pulls back from his mouth as he nuzzles into the underside of her jaw, and she sits on his thighs.

"Sit up," she orders, pulling his shoulders off the pillows. She grasps the bottom of his T-shirt and shoves it up, up, nails digging clumsily into his skin as she encourages him to sit off the pillows, yanks it over his head with a satisfied moan. Robin's hands are under her shirt, coasting over her belly, up to her ribs, back down.

A frustrated huff of air blows past her lips, his blue eyes darkened and watching her, his breath in pants. She feels powerful like she has never felt before, the way he looks at her as though she is something precious and unique, irreplaceable, but she doesn't want this slow and tender, she needs him to be fast and rough, needs the distance between them gone. She holds his wrist against the pillows, and comes back to kiss him, skims her free hand down his muscled chest. He reaches for her neck and tilts her head at a steeper angle. When she lets his hand go, it works under her shirt again, frees a third button, trails up and down on her belly, and she's tired of waiting, sits half up for a second and has the garment up and over her head.

" _Hey!_ " he protests, watching for a moment as the silk flutters away and to the ground, then half-glaring at her, pouting indignantly, "I was getting to that."

She grinds down again, trailing kisses up his jaw, and sighs as his hands fly to her hips and his fingers dig into her flesh. "Not fast enough."

He twists the ends of her hair around one hand, pushing it behind her shoulders with an affectionate smile, tinged with desperation, slack-jawed enough to make her smirk. "So stubborn," he sighs.

She arches into him, gasping out a satisfied whimper when his hands finally, finally find her breasts, his lips closing around a nipple, his thumb teasing the other.

When he switches to the other breast, and his teeth scrape against her, her hips stuttering as she works against him, she loses all patience. With a wave of her hand, the rest of their clothes vanish, and with a whimper she shifts and sinks onto him, pleasure blooming low in her belly.

…

His lips fall away from her with his groan, his shoulder blades pressed into the pillows, one hand in her hair and the other twisting into a pillowcase as his hips lift to meet hers, fighting to slow her into a rhythm, and to take his time. She clenches around him, the pleasure makes him dizzy, and he loses himself in the feel of her; they will have time for slow; they will have time for everything.

When he lifts his head to mouth at her collarbone, his hands finding and kneading her breasts again, he feels her tense muscles, her bunched shoulders and strained arms, pants of breath escaping gritted teeth as she swallows her moans, and he can sense the way she's trying to hold back, quiet whimpers falling over lips pressed shut. But he's falling apart, and he wants her to as well; he wants them both to fall apart, together. And so he moves to kiss her lips again, open-mouthed and eager, ghosts his hands over her ribs to her waist, and flips them over, off the pillows and onto cool silk sheets, and the movement buries him deeper inside her, they both gasp.

He brings a hand between them and twists her nipple with his thumb, and her sudden moan has him quickening the pace, pushing into her deeper, faster, as her hand fists into the hair at the nape of his neck, tugging, her heel digging into his hip. She stretches her neck up for a kiss, all tongues and scraping teeth and muffled groans, and then her other leg comes around his back, the angle changed, and she tears her lips off of his with a moan.

Her hands grab at his hips to hold him there. He gasps, balancing his weight lower on one forearm and finds the spot again, thrusts into it over and over, and the noises falling freely from her lips now make his ears buzz, pleasure rushing up his spine in bursts, his jaw falling open.

"Robin—I'm," she gasps, her eyes hazy with desire, her voice stinting and breathless. He trails kisses down her neck, on the swell of her breasts, their bodies pressed even closer, her muscles taut beneath him.

He slides his fingers between hers where he has her hand pinned to the mattress, the muscles straining from supporting his weight, and he can feel her toes curling into his back, her hips arching off the bed haphazardly to meet his. "Let go," he breathes into her ear with a kiss to her pulse point, nips at her jaw, her earlobe, still making her groan each time he hits that spot, losing control. "Let go, Regina, I've got you. I love you." She reaches an arm around his neck at that, her heels digging into his lower back.

Her face scrunches up; she's trying to fight the intensity of it, but he can feel in the strain of her muscles, can hear in her hitching breath, how close she is. He summons every ounce of restraint he has, his movements on the border between passionate and frantic, and cradles her jaw, his forehead pressing into hers, gasps her name on an exhale, everything he feels wrapped into it, a tense whisper. Dark brown eyes meet his, and something she sees must push her over the edge, with one more thrust she's crying out _Robin_ and shaking, nails digging into his skin, her eyes squeezed shut, her muscles quivering around him as she comes. The feel of her, watching her writhe in pleasure, his name on her lips for a second time, _Robin!_ , and the wave of ecstasy crashes over him, and he falls with her, holding out for a moment before his body collapses onto hers.

His eyes blink open to the sight of hers, dark, content, warm, her lips curled in a soft smile.

"You are absolutely stunning," he tells her, when he's caught his breath.

"Robin," she sighs. He loves the sound, caught between exasperation and affection, his name can become a hundred different words from her lips. Everything is foggy, relaxed, nothing between them.

He lifts his head to catch her eyes. "You are," he insists. He lies down beside her, grinning at her whimper of protest, pulls her over until she's settled against his side. She traces her fingers over his chest as their breathing slows to normal. "We're just going to lie here for a moment," he explains, tilting his neck down to look at her and moving a handful of her hair out of her eyes.

"And then?" Her jaw presses into him, her words vibrating against his skin.

He picks up her hand from his chest and lifts it to his lips, presses a slow, open mouth to her palm, kisses a line from her palm to her wrist to halfway up her forearm, all on sensitive skin until goosebumps start to rise there. "I am going to kiss every inch of your body." She smiles, a little nervous, hesitant, and he remembers her stopping him, in what feels like another lifetime—the only other time they'd been together. "All right?" he breathes, running fingers down her arm to tangle with hers.

"Yeah."

He hesitates himself, unsure of whether he's pushed her too far, and then she's wrapping a hand around his shoulder, lying back, and encouraging him to move towards her.

He kisses her forehead first, and when she smiles sleepily, he kisses every inch of her face, her chin and brow and nose and cheeks.

When he reaches her hairline, he halts suddenly, his head resting against hers and she feels a tear drop onto her skin. "Robin?" she asks, reaching a hand up to the back of his neck.

He rests his lips against the electrocution scar, shaking a little. "I'm sorry," he whispers.

She uses the hand at the back of his neck to guide his face back to hers. "It's all right," she assures him, smoothing his frown away with her thumb.

He buries his face in her neck, half his weight on top of her, one of his legs tucked between her own, but she does not feel forced, weighed down, backed into a corner as she once had with Leopold, she feels safe, and she will comfort him for once. She strokes her fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck, angles her head to kiss his temple.

When he finally speaks, his voice is rough, not with tears but with a kind of deeper felt anguish that has her trying to tug him closer. "I feel such guilt for what I've done to you," he says into her neck, swallowing thickly as one of his hands reaches blindly to curl around hers. "You _trusted_ me, and I broke that trust so many times, in so many ways, I can't understand how you've found it in your heart to forgive me."

She tilts her chin against his head, and this conversation is better this way, close and holding each other but not looking into his eyes. His hair tickles against her chin, his stubble scratching against her collarbone. "Perhaps the same way you've found it in _your_ heart to forgive _me._ " And she does not understand it, at least not yet, but it is true, he loves all of her, he has forgiven her, she cannot deny it. "I needed to forgive you, because I love you."

He lifts his head at that, pressing his forehead into hers, rasps, "I love you."

This time, she lets him kiss every inch of her skin, tenderly at first, then passionately, until she's quivering with need, but she lets him take his time, explore all of her, find the spots that make her gasp and writhe and whimper his name, and when she finds her release at last, crying out, her head grinding back into the pillows, her fingers twisting in the sheets, she has never felt anything so intense.

.

.

.

After, she runs the back of her hand under his chin with a soft smile. "Can we stay here for a while?"

He moves down so that their foreheads press together, wedges one of his legs between hers, runs a hand up and down her arm. "Roland's away until tomorrow night, and the next place you have to be is at the Charmings' for dinner and to pick up Henry. If you want, we can stay here for the next twelve hours." He kisses her cheek. "Well, I may need to go find us some food in the kitchen, but otherwise—"

"Okay," she chuckles, settling against him to drift off into a nap.

.

.

.

"We should probably get dressed," he says, a few hours later, when they wake, watching as his fingers draw aimless patterns on her back.

She makes no move to get up, but rather snuggles back into him. "In a minute."

His thumb caresses her hip. "You sound like Roland when I dress him in the morning."

"Well, you're distracting." She runs a hand down his arm and laces their fingers together.

His lips quirk into a smile as she turns over to face him, propping her elbows on his chest. He lifts a hand to run through her hair, remembers her using that word quite a lot in the Enchanted Forest.

"I've always been quite a distraction, then," he teases.

Her expression suddenly becomes more serious, her eyes intense. "You're more than that." Her voice cracks like it had the afternoon when she told him about the tattoo to begin with, and she turns her head to press her lips to the mark on his wrist.

His lips are chapped, his muscles sore, but he doesn't care, he'll never have enough of her, and he rolls so that she's beneath him. "For a long time, I thought I'd never be as happy as you make me," he confesses, his lips against her temple.

They'll get dressed in a minute.

.

.

.

And so Snow and David find out in a much less artful fashion than the fairy. Regina knocks on their door for dinner, twenty minutes late, Robin's hand closed around hers.


End file.
